Qass 
Book 



CRITICAL REMARKS 



ON 

DETACHED PASSAGES 

OF THE 

NEW TESTAMENT, 

PARTICULARLY 

THE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN. 



BY THE LATE 

FRENCH LAURENCE, L. L. D. M, P. 

PROFESSOR OF CIVIL LAW IN THE UNIVERSITY 
OF OXFORD^ he. 8cC. 



OXFORD; 

At the Univeriity Prefs, for J. Parker j 
And Meflrs. Rivington, St. Paul's Church Yard, and J. 
Hatch ARD, Piccadilly, London. 

1810. 



5 PREFACE, 



IHE Author of the following production 
was too highly diftinguiflied in the political 
world to render necelTary any eulogium on 
his public talents and integrity, were an al- 
lufion to them in this place appropriate. 
But the reader's attention will be folely di- 
refted to the merit of his literary character ; 
a merit indeed which was duly appreciated 
by a numerous circle of private friends, and 
moft efteemed by thofe who knew him beft. 
The extent both of his general information 
and of his claffical erudition, the refinement 
of his tafte, as well as the depth and indefa- 
tigability of his refearch, the acutenefs of his 
remark, the cogency of his argument, and 
the reftitude of his judgment, were all ac- 
knowledged and admired. His critical abi- 
lities in particular were fo greatly refpefted 
by the late Mr. Burke, that in an advertife- 

a 2 ment 



iv 



ment prefixed to the fecond edition of a 
trad, entitled, An Appeal from the new to 
" the old Whigs/' that illuftrious writer 
publicly defcribed him, as a very learned 
perfon, to the partiality of whofe friend- 
ftiip he owed much, to the feverity of 
whofe judgment he owed more." 
Nor perhaps will it be wholly irrelevant 
to notice the following infcription, which 
appears in a copy of Refledions on the 
Revolution in France," prefented to him 
by the fon of the Author. 

" To 

A tried friend of his Father's, 
And the affociate of his mofh important labors, 
French Laurence, LLD. 
D. D. D. 
Richard Burke ; 
As a bond of fublifting friendfhip. 
And, in cafe of alienation, 
(If that Hiould ever happen) 
A fecurity againft extremities, 
And an inducement to reconciliation : 
A token of afFedion whilft living, 
And 

A memorial when dead. 
June 28, 1793." 

To 



V 



To this teftimony of regard, exhibited by 
the fon, may be added another, conferred 
by the father himfelf, at the moft miferable 

ml 

period of his exiftence, when that idolized 
fon was now no more. It is written in a 
copy of Hamilton's tranflation of the He- 
daya," and is thus worded ; 

" Thefe volumes, given to me by Mr. Dundas, I 
humbly beg may be accepted of by my worthy 
friend and fellow labourer Dr. French Lawrence, 
all my publick cares and ftudies being now at an 
end. This unfortunate Auguft 1794. There is 
great power of mind and a very fubtle jurifpru- 
dence fhewn in this work. 

Edm. Burke." 

His long intimacy indeed with Mr. Burke, 
and the teftamentary confidence ultimately 
repofed in him, fufficiently prove how highly 
he ranked in the eftimation of one, whofe 
perfonal attachments alone conferred cele- 
brity. And, had not his numerous avoca- 
tions prevented him, he would certainly 
have undertaken the execution of that, 
which he always fully intended to execute, 
a hiftory of the life and public connections 
of his ever memorable friend ; the hiftory of 

no 



VI 



no common man, and of no unimportant 
period. But his own participation in the 
political occurrences of his time, the preffure 
of paffing events, and the importunate la 
hours of his profeffion, rendered fo arduous 
an undertaking impracticable. 

It was, however, impoffible for him to be 
idle. The hours which he could occalion- 
ally call his own, he for years together de- 
dicated to Biblical Studies, which were al- 
ways his favourite purfuit, and to which his 
love of critical inveftigation feems to have 
irrefiftibly impelled him. The fruits of thefe 
Jiorce fubfecivcEy fuch at leaft as could be 
colled.ed from his papers, are now laid be- 
fore the public. 

He polTelTed a manufcript harmony of the 
New Teftament, compofed by Dr. Yardley, 
formerly Archdeacon of Cardigan. In this, 
which contained fufRcient fpace for addi- 
tional obfervations, he inferted from time to 
time his own remarks, as they arofe in his 
mind, and as he could fnatch the opportu- 
nity of committing them to writing. The 
order, therefore, of Dr. Yardley's Harmony 
is neceffarily prefer ved. 

The Revelation of St„ John appears prin- 
cipally 



Vll 

cipally to have attraded his notice, and con- 
fequently occupies no inconfiderable portion 
of the follow^ing pages. While engaged in 
the elucidation of this prophetical book, he 
was thus flattered in a complimentary let- 
ter addrelTed to him by a peer, then in a 
high official fituation. " The w^hole fubjeft 
of prophecy," obferved his noble correfpon- 
dent, is mofl: myfterious, but at the fame 
time fo awfully important, that I feel a fatis- 
faftion in finding a man of your ftrong fenfe 
and learning inclined to the ferious confi- 
deration of it." 

The Author's intention moll probably 
was, not only to have completed his expoli- 
tion of the Revelation, but to have enlarged 
his remarks on the other parts of the New 
Teflament, and, after having revifed his ftyle 
and expreffion, to have ultimately publifhed 
the whole. Such feems to have been his 
intention, but it was fruftrated by the hand 
of Death ! The prefent work, therefore, is 
profefledly imperfeft ; fl:ill however, in the 
eyes at leaft of thofe, who loved and admired 
him, 

Refplendent fragmina arena. 



VEN as they delivered them unto us, which 
from the heginning were eye-witnejfes, and nii^ 
7iijlers of the word, Luke i. 2. 

There is an ambiguity here, which is not in the 
original^. It would run better thus; Even as 
they, who from the heginning were eye-w'itnejfesy 
and miniflers of the word, delivered them unto us. 

It feemed good to nie alfo, having had perfect un- 
derftanding of all things, Luke i. 3. 

It Ihould rather be, having made exaSi inveft-ls^a- 
tion into all things ; a phrafe, which is nearefc to 
the hteral force of Tvo.^wKoKoh^ny.oTi, and which does 
not diredlly point to perfonal knowledge, as the 
language of the received tranflation feems to im- 
ply. 

And in the fixth month the angel Gabriel was fent 
from God, &c. Luke i. 26. 
^ Jofeph Scahger fixed the nativity in autumn, 

* I rely for the reading of the Greek MSS. on the labori- 
ous, judicious, and, as far as any human work can be^ I had 
almoft faid, the perfecl critical edition of the four Evangelifts, 
by Grie{bach in 1796. 

^ Canon Ifagogic. lib. iii. p. ^06. ed. 1658. 

B and 



2 



and Beroaldus was of the fame opinion. ^Tille- 
mont informs us, that the Conception was cele- 
brated by the Spanifli churches on the i8th of 
December, which would carry the birth to the be- 
ginning or middle of September. Upon the fup- 
pofition, then, that Chrift was born about the pe- 
riod of the feafi: of Tabernacles, (which is cele- 
brated between the 15th and 2 2d of the month 
Tifhri, or towards the latter end of September,) 
there would be a great and peculiar beauty of allu- 
lion in the phrafe, which St. John ufes in his 
Gofpel, c. i. V. 14. " And the Word was made 
flefh," nxi EiTHnvco^ev (V /'/Aiv, afi-'d pltcked his taber^ 
nacle among us ; as it fhould properly be tranflated, 
and not limply, dwelt among us. Thus would the 
three great events of the Chriflian difpenfation, 
which was to be the fulfilment of the Law, coin- 
cide with the periods of the three great feftivals 
under the Law ; (Deuteron. xvi. and Levit. xxiii-) 
the entrance of Chrift into the tabernacle of the 
fiefh, with the feaft of Tabernacles ; his death, and 
the redemption of mankind, with the facrifice of 
the unblemifhed lamb at the Paffover, in remem- 

^ Memoir. Ecclefiaft. vol. i. p. 178. Clemens of Alexan- 
dria^ who died In 216^ and who, i believe, is the oidell writer 
tlxat mentions the day of the celebration of Chrift's birth, tells 
us in his Stromata, i. p. 340. that in his time fome fixed the 
birth to the 19th and 20th of April, and others to the 20th 
of Maj ; and he fpeaks himfelf of it as wholly uncertain. 

brancc 



3 



brance of the redemption of Ifrael from Egypt ; 
and the defcent of the holy Spirit, for the guidance 
of the church, with the feaft of Week.s, which was 
called the joy of the Law. and which was fixed in 
the third month, when (as may be gathered from 
Exod. xix. I.) the Lord defcended in fire on 
Mount Sinai^ and called up Moles to receive the 
Law. 

And there were hi the fame country Jhepherds ahid- 
ing in the field ^ keeping zvatch over their flocks hy 
night, Luke ii. 8. 

This fadl, that at the tim.e of the Nativit}^ there 
were fhepherds abiding in the field, keefii7ig watch 
over their fiocks hy nighty agrees very well with 
the fuppofition that Jefus was born in September, 
but not with the time commonly aiiigned for that 
great event in December. It was not till fome 
little time after the feaft of Tabernacles^ that the 
autumnal rains began to fall in Judea. About 
the latter end of November fires began to be ufed 
in their houfes, (fee Jeremiah xxxvi. 22.) and the 
fevere part of the winter ufually fet in about the 
middle of December, attended with heavy and 
cold rains, (fee Ezra x. 9.) and fometimes very 
fnarp frofts. Mr. Harmer in his Obfervations 
(vol. i. Obf. 4, and 5, &c. and vol. iii. Obf. 7,) 
has colledled various inftances of men and beafts 
perifhing from tlie inclemency of the weather ia 
B a Judea I 



4 



Judea ; and I obferve they are dated chiefly be- 
ween the 1 2th of December and the 20th of Ja- 
nuary. Our Saviour himfelf^ when he warns his 
difciples to fly from the impending deftrudlion of 
Jerufalem, diredls them, in allulion to the fevere 
incommodities of the (eafon, to pray that their 
flight may not he i?i the winter. Matthr xxiv. 20. 
and Mark xiii. 18. 

And when the days of her purification, according 
to the law of Mofes^ were accomplijhed, 

Luke ii. 22. 

Mr. Whiflon fuppofes the purification to have 
been after the return from Egypt. His principal 
reafon is, that St. Luke immediately after fays, 
that the holy family returned into Galilee. But 
in this arrangement he has no followers^ and his ar- 
gument is by no means cogent. 

And he came and divelt in a city called Nazareth : 
that it might he fulfilled which was fpoke?i hy the 
ProphetSy He fhall he called a Nazarene, 

Matt. ii. 23. 
It is well known, that no where in the Prophets 
can any fuch words be found. Dr. Macknight 
fuppofes, that the allulion is to the predictions, 
which reprefent Chrift as to be defpifed and re- 
jedled of his countrymen ; to be treated, as the 
Jews treated all Galileans : and fo St. Matthew 

refers 



5 



refers to the fenfe, not the expreffion, of the Pro- 
phets. Others beheve that he rather alludes to the 
found than the meaning of fome paffages in the 
Hebrew Scriptures ; efpecially to the name of the 
branch, which in the original is pronounced in a 
manner refembling the firft two fyliables of Na^co- 
f atoj : and as St. Matthew is generally thought to 
have written in Hebrew, this is no improbable fo- 
lution. 

And when they had performed all things accord- 
ing to the law of the Lord, they returned into 
Galilee, to their own city Nazareth. 

Luke ii. 39. 

That is, after the death of Herod, when they 
came back from Egypt. There does not feem to 
me any thing in the context which fuppofes the 
return into Galilee to have been fo immediate, as 
to be at variance with St. Matthew's account of 
the flight into Egypt. But Dr. Mack night pro- 
bably thinking otherwife, imagines that the holy 
family went back into Galilee, and then returned a 
fecond time to Bethlehem, as conceiving the edu- 
cation of Jefus, as well as his birth at that place, to 
be neceffary to his better reception in the charadler 
of the Mefliah. 



» 3 



Wift 



6 



Wiji ye not iJiat I nvjjl he about my Father s huft* 
nefs? Luke ii. 49. 

El/ Toi? Tou TTCiTcoc v.ou. Palairct^ after the Syriac 
and Armenian veriions, and many learned com- 
mentators of modern times, underftand this to 
mean, not about my Father s bufmefs^ but, In my 
Father s houfe. So in Ifocrates ra x-^v fhands 
for the tem-ples of the gods : roc UoczXov in the An- 
thologia is the hoi'fe of Proclus\ and a ra Auxwvoj 
in Theocritus, Id. ii. v. 76. means, where is Ly- 
cons houfe f upon which, the fchohaft tells us, that 
we mufc underftand otxraara. But there is per- 
haps a ftill better authority, as from the New Tef- 
tament itfelf, in John xix. 27. where £k ra \^i(x, 
means indifputably, into his own houfe. I prefer, 
in my Father s houfe ; or literally, with an elliplis 
limilar to the Greek, at my Father s. 

But Herod the tetrarch, being reproved by him for 
Herodias his brother Philip's wife^ and for all 
the evils which Herod had done, added yet this 
above all^ that he fhut up John in pr if on. 

Luke iii. 19, 20. 

Thefe two verfes are parenthetical, and much 
anticipate the event of John's imprifonment. Com- 
pare Matthew iv. 12. Mark i. 14. and John iii, 
£3. and 24. See alfo Luke vii. 18, 19, &c. &c. 

And 



7 



And Jefus^ when he was haptized, went up firaighU 
way out of the water ; and^ Jo, the heavens were 
opened unto him, and he Jaw the Spirit of God 
defcending like a dove, and lighting upon him. 

Matt. iii. i6. 

In the initiation of the high prieft, according to 
the ceremonies of the Jewifh law^ (Exod. xxix, 
4 — 7.) he was wajhed with water, and then anoint- 
ed with oil upon his head. But Jefus was confe- 
derated to his high-priefthood by this haptifm of 
John, and the defcent of the Holy Ghoft^ which 
Peter, in his difcourfe to Cornelius, A6ls x. 38. 
calls the anointing with the Holy Ghofl. 

That was the true Light, which Ughteth every mau 
that Cometh into the world. John i, 9. 

Grotius, Doddridge, Beaufobre, and L'Enfant 
would underlland the fenfe to be, That was the 
true light, which coming into the world enlighten- 
eth every man." But Palairet ftrongly fortifies 
our common tranflation, which by the way is the 
natural and obvious fyntax. He fhews by ex- 
amples, that coming into the world, or comifig into 
light, means in Greek authors to be born ; and 
that Hippocrates, in an epigram of Nicomedes in 
the Anthologia^ 1. i. c. 39. ep. i. is called (pao? ^s- 
^oTTojv, the light of men, becaufe he faved many. 

Yet from the obfervation which follows, that 
B 4 he 



8 



he was in the world^'' left we might fuppofe that 
he v:as not there before he was fent^ and from an 
apparent antitheiis here between our Saviour and 
the Baptift, the latter of whom iytviro a7r2raAiw,£vo?, 
was created and fent^ and the former m i^yo^j^zvovy 
exijied and came, Bengelius agrees with Grotius 
and the others on that fide : and I incline to them, 
as the whole of this preface is highly wrought^ and 
the terms moft metaphyfically difcriminated. 

Which were horn, 7iot of hlood, nor of the will of 
the flejli^ nor of the will of man, hut of God, 

John i, 13. 

a'lOtaTwv^ in the plural, that is, of commixture 
of Hoods, and not fimply of blood. On the phrafe, 
the will of the flejh, Bengelius remarks, Caro, 
eaque una, eft maritus et uxor and upon the 
will of man, (ccv^poc, viri) Etenim matrem habe- 
bat Chriftus, fed viri ignaram." This is inge- 
nious^ and here I almoft think not too refined. 

^nd the Word was made flejh^ and dwelt among us, 
and we beheld his glory, John i. 14. 

Palairet produces inftances where <TmvQ\jv, in old 
Greek writers, means fimply to inhabit, as in Phi- 
loftratus. Icon. 1. ii. p. m. 846. and Ariftides, t. i. 
p. m. 82, &c. I think there is fomething more in 
£T)ciivwo-£v £v Yi^iv, pitched his tabernacle among us. 
See before p. 2. There may alfo be here an allu- 

fion 



9 



lion to the pitching of the tabernacle of the ark 
by Solomon^ in the month of September^ and to 
the glory which then filled the temple. 

Full of grace and truth, John i. 14. 

The Cambridge MS. of Beza, and one other, as 
well as fome of the ancient Fathers, read TrXn^n in- 
flead of 7i'Xvi^yi?5 and fo refer it, without a parenthells, 
to ^Ifxv, glory. But this feems rather an arbitrary 
change to make the context plainer. 

John hare witnefs of him, and cried^ fay '^^^g-i This 
was he of whom I /pake. Ibid. 15. 

I prefer the word tefiimony to that of witnefs^ 
for the fake of having the fame word repeated in 
V. 19. of the Englifh, as it is in Greek. 

Bengelius happily obferves, that the Evangelift 
having, in the 14th verfe, related the incarnation, 
never afterwards throughout his Gofpel calls Chrift 
the Word, rov Aoyov ; which defignates the fecond 
hypofhafis of the divine effence. 

And of his fulnefs have all we received, and grace 
for grace, lb. 16. 

Griefbach, on the authority of the beft MSS. 
and fome ancient verfions, Origen, and others of 
the Fathers, read on, for, infhead of y.xi, and, Xa- 
f tv avTi y_oi^iro<;, according to the Greek idiom, may 
better be rendered grace upon grace, Bengelius, 

in 



10 



m his Gnomon, thinks it properly means the fuc- 
cejfion of greater to lefs, not the mere accejfion of 
that which is eqiiah He quotes ^fchylus and 
Chryfoftom, Ub. vi. de Sacerdotio ; but more ex- 
amples might be produced. I think the phrafe 
means limply, the fupervention of that which is 
greater. Perhaps the full force of it can only be 
given by a circumlocution, grace Jiill fucceeded hy 
greater grace, 

St. Auguf^in, as Tillemont obferves in his notes 
on John the Baptift, attributes to him the i6th, 
17th, and 18th verfes, as well as the 15th. St. 
Chryfofbom always affigns the i8th verfe to the 
Evangelift ; but, in one parage of his homily on 
John, he gives the i6th and 17th to the Baptift ; 
yet, in another part of the fame homily (which, 
adds Tillemont, is a little ftrange) he fays, that 
they belong to the Evangelift. The learned an- 
notator himfelf doubts, whether the Baptift ever 
ufed the term Jefus Chrift. To me they feem 
clearly to be the language of the facred hiftorian, 
taking up again and expanding the fubjedl of the 
14th verfe; as afterwards, from the 19th to the 
34th, he takes up and expands the fubjedl to the 
15th. Bengeiius in his Gnomon obferves, Pie- 
nitudo V. 16. refertur ad plenum v. 14." 



And 



A7id Jefus h'mfelf began to he aboiU thirty years of 
age, being {as was fup^ofed) the Jon of Jofeph. 

Luke iii. 23, 

wv, CO? ivofj^ii^sro^ vlog Iu)(Tv(p, &c. Somc underftand the 
word u^yofj-ivoq to mean, beginning his min'iftry\ and 
Mr. Whifton, in fupport of this conftrudlion, re- 
marks, that another participle of the fame verb 
(fltP^apEvoc) feem_s to be iifed abfolutely in a fimilar 
fenfe by St. Luke xxiii. 5. and xxiv. 47. A«5ls 
xxi. 22. and Adls x. 37. And though the in- 
Hances are not exadlly parallel, they do in my opi- 
nion feem fufficient for the purpofe of ftrong illuf- 
tration. The tranflation then fhould be, And 
Jefus was himfelf about thirty years of age when 
he began his miniftry, (or, more clofely to the 
letter, when he was initiated^ being, as was fup- 
pofed, the fon of Jofeph, &c." The loofe phrafe 
of about thirty years of age, wVa £rcov T^{axovT(%, will 
then be near enough to the truth, if Jefus were 
three or four and thirty ; and the mention of his 
being thirty is lignificant, hecaufe before thirty no 
perfon could be initiated high prieft. But the 
common conftrucftion and tranflation are very fiat 
and inconfiftent ; and if he begati to be about thirty, 
lie was not then thirty ; and it is very improbable 
that he, who came to fulfil the law^ fhould enter 

upon 



12 



upon his high-priefthood before the legal age of 
being capable to exercife the fundlions of that 
office. More than one difficulty is obviated by 
the interpretation which I prefer. 

Koecher mentions eleven writers, moftly of emi- 
nence, who have underftood a^p^^ojusvo? in this pecu- 
Har fenfe. But he quotes Dr. Yardley (I believe 
in his genealogy of Chrift) as interpreting the word 
to mtm.fuhjeB to his parents. Bowyer refers it to 
the commencement of the miniftry, and cites Lan- 
gius de Annis Chrifti, who fays that Juftin Martyr, 
Origen, and Euthymius appear to have fo con- 
Urued it. None of thefe writers are included in 
Koecher's enumeration. 

Parkhurft in his Lexicon (ed. 1798.) adopts Dr. 
Yardley's interpretation. On the other hand, 
Schleufner adopts the fenfe which I prefer ; a^- 
yoi^ivoq cum docendt munus aufpicaretur : for which 
he refers to a diflertation of Sommelius on this 
paffage, publifhed in 1774. 

Then the Devil taketh him up into the holy city, and 
fetteth him on a pinnacle of the temple, &c. 

Matt. iv. 5, &c. 

Piikington obferves, " The two Evangelifts give 
the three temptations in a different order ; but St. 
Matthew appears to defcribe them in their true or- 
der, from the notes of time, ton v. 5. and ^aXtv 

y. 8. 



13 



r. 8. And thus the temptations rife gradually 
from weaker to ftronger, as do the reproofs of our 
Lord," 

Dr. Wells thinks the fame ; and Newcome in 
his Harmony accommodates the narrative of St, 
Luke by a tranfpofition to the arrangement of St. 
Matthew. 

Dr. Macknight does the fame, and obferves, 
that otherwife we muft take the folution of M. 
Toignard, that the temptation to idolatry was re- 
peated, the Devil taking Jefus a fecond time into 
the high mountain for that purpofe. 

Thefe things were done In Bethahara beyond Jor- 
dan^ where John was baptizing. John i. 28. 

Griefbach reads Bethany ; but the fituation of 
that town by no means agrees with the circum- 
llances of the narrative. Chryfoftom, and before 
him Origen, ftill more fully had prefTed this argu- 
ment. The latter fays, that in his time Bethabara 
(or, as he there calls it, ftill more nearly to the 
traces of the Greek name of Bethany, Bethara) 
was fhewn to travellers on the banks of the Jor- 
dan, as the place where tradition reported John to 
have baptized. Suidas and Theophyladl alfo fup- 
port the reading of Bethabara, See Mill. I muft 
alfo add, that Bengelius agrees with Mill in pre- 
ferring Bethabara. Yet Michaelis (and on the 
whole I concur with him) defends the reading of 

Bethany^ 



14 



Bethany^ which was in all the MSS. before Origan, 
and remarks, that by this very phrafe the Evan- 
gelift feems careful to prevent the miftake of Be- 
thany near Jerufalem, calling this Bethany beyond 
Jordan, as if to diftinguifh it from another place of 
the fame name, juft as we fay Frankfort on the 
Oder, in Germany ; or in England, Newcaftle 
upon Tyne, for the purpofe of a limilar difcrimina- 
tion. He adds too, that the place may probably 
have been deflroyed before the time of Origen, 
poffibly in the Jewilli wars, or his guides may ^ have 
carried him by another road. 

And I knew him not. John i. 33. 

St. Matthew (iii. 16.) informs us, that the de- 
fcent of the Spirit was after the baptifm of Jefus ; 
yet in the preceding verfes 14 and 15, he feems to 
reprefent John as knowing Chrift before his bap- 
tifm. How is that to be reconciled with this, / 
knew him not? To get rid of this difficulty, St. 
Auguftin fays, that John knew Chrift before; but 
what he learned from the defcent of the Spirit was, 
that Chrift fhould baptize with the Spirit, fo that 
the Spirit fhould always be communicated by bap- 
tifm in his name, and under his authorization. 
Chryfoftom, on the other hand, fuppofes, that 
Johji, having always lived in the defert, did not 
perfonally know Jefus, but that it was revealed to 
him, when Jefus came to be baptized^ that he was 

the 



15 



the Chrift ; and ^:his being immediately after con- 
firmed by the predicted lign of the defcent of the 
Spirit, the Baptifi:, as is common in ordinary lan- 
guage, refers his knowledge to that event, which 
removed every doubt, and at the fame time was a 
tefb of the truth of his own miffion. If this fhould 
not be fatisfadlory, Tillemont fuggefts, that there 
may have been a previous defcent of the Spirit 
vifible to John alone^ as well as the public defcent 
after the baptifm. 

Again the next day after, J ejus fiood^ and two of 
his difciples. John i. 35. 
The Evangelift himfelf is generally thought to 
have been one of the two difciples here mentioned. 
And this fuppoHtion is very congenial with the 
modefty, which forbids him to name himfelf di- 
redlly in the moft important palTages of his Gof- 
pel. 

He faith unto them. Come and fee. They came and 
faw where he dwelt, and abode with him that 
day : for it was about the tenth hour. Ibid. 39. 

It was about the tenth hour, according to tiie 
, Jewifh and Roman mode of reckoning the hours 
of the day ; this would be about four o'clock in 
the afternoon, and only two hours before the con- 
cluHon of the Jewifh day. How^ then could the 
two difciples b^ faid after this to have abode with 

him 



16 



him that day, and Andrew, having ftaid at leall 
fome conliderable part of the day, to have gone, 
found his brother Simon, and brought him to Jefus 
that fame day ? This is clearly inconliftent, Mr. 
Townfon, therefore, argues from hence, and cer- 
tainly with great efFedl, that St. John appears to 
have computed the hours as we now do. It was 
ten in the morning. He draws the fame inference 
from two paffages in the fourth chapter, and inti- 
mates, that the Evangelift feems fbudioufly to 
mark his mode of computing the hours thus early 
in his Gofpel, as a notice to his readers. 

In addition to this note I mull obferve, that 
Mr. Townfon's arguments had been previoufly 
ufed by Dr. Macknight ; and that Dr. Wells, in 
his Effay on the Harmony of the Gofpels, had 
long before remarked, that it was now ten clock 
in the morning ; for he fays that St. John ufes 
(what he calls, though erroneoufly) the Roman 
way of reckoning the hours. Indeed others before 
him had faid the fame. 

Before that Philip called thee, when thou wajl un- 
der the fig-tree, I jaw thee, John i. 48. 

Mr. Harmer, (vol. iv. p. 105.) having fhewn 
that a modern oriental garden of a Turkifh go- 
vernor contained only two vines, one fig, and one 
pomegranate tree, walled round ; and having made 
it probable, that the ancient gardens of private 

Jews 



17 



Jews did not contain more trees, fup poles our Sa- 
viour's meaning to be, When thou wall at thy 
devotional exercifes, in the retirement of thy gar- 
den, walled round, and concealed from the eyes 
of men, I faw thee " But it may be enough to 
fuppofe our Saviour merely intended to evince his 
fupernatural knowledge, by telling Nathaniel under 
which of his trees he had chofen his feat, for what- 
ever purpofe, of devotion, or mere recreation, in a 
fecluded privacy impervious to human fight* And 
even thus conlidered, how is the force and fpirit of 
the paffage improved by the notion of a walledt 
garden^ fo ingenioufly fuggefted by Mr. Harmer ! 

The place of the call both of Philip and Natha- 
niel does not appear ; but, from the manner in 
which Bethfaida (ftridlly fpeaking, not in Galilee) 
and Nazareth are mentioned, it feems not to have 
happened in either of thofe towns. It may poffi- 
bly have been at Tiberias, to which place Jefus 
may have gone by water, and which was a hkeiy 
place for the relidence of fuch a man as Nathaniel, 
as it was probably even then the principal feat of 
thofe Pharifees, Rabbis, and Lawyers, of whom we 
read in the Gofpel during Chrift's miniftry in Ga- 
lilee ; becaufe we know that, upon the defi:ru61:ioa 
of Jerufalem, it became at once the capital of He- 
brew learning. From Tiberias, the next morning 
(that is, the third day, from the teftimony of John) 
Jefus with his difciples might eafily proceed to 
c Na:5areth, 



18 

Nazareth, not above fifteen miles, receive the in- 
vitation, and be at Cana, about ten miles diflant^ 
in the afternoon ; the time of the marriage-fupper 
being about fix in the evening. 

Bifhop Newcome fuppofes the call of Philip to 
have taken place in Bethabara, and the third day 
(c. ii. V. I.) to mean the third day after his arrival 
in Galilee. 

Theyi /aid the Jews^ Forty and Jise years was tins 
temple hi building, John ii. 20. 

This paiTage clearly difproves the vulgar com- 
putation of the birth of Cbrift. The temple here 
meant is that which was rebuilt and enlarged by 
Herod. It was never entirely completed, as wc 
gather from a palTage in Jofephus, who attributes 
much of the tumults in Jerufalem, juft before the 
Jewifh war, to the number of workmen difcharged 
from the temple. At the time here mentioned by 
St. John, it had been begun forty^x years. Now 
fome writers place the commencement of the 
building fo early as the 23d, and none later than 
the 17th year before the vulgar aera of Chrift's 
birth. But this would make him at moft only 
twenty- nine years of age at this time, while we 
have the pofitive teftimony of St. Luke, that he 
was at leaft thirty- one, if not thirty- two. 



For 



For God Jo hved the worlds that he gave his ony 
begotten Son, Sec. John iii. i6. 

Mr. Pilkington in his Harmony thinks, that 
what is faid from verfe 1 6 to the end of verfe 2 1 
contains the Evangehil's account of the delign and 
efiedl of Chrifl's coming into the worlds and not 
a continuation of our Saviour's difcourfe, both 
from the akeration of the Ityle, and from the title 
of the only hegotfen Son of God, which he con-^ 
ceives that Chrift would fcarcely give himfelf. 

This feems worthy of confideration. The ftyle 
appears to me very limilar to that of the Evan- 
gelift in chap. i. 16^ 17, 18. Our tranflators, 
make a new paragraph at the i6th verfe^ but there 
is no new pericope in the Greek MSS. 

Now Jacob's well was there, Jefus therefore, being 
wearied with his journey, fa( thus on the welL 

John iv. 6, 

Thus, ouTw?. Mr. Harmer would render it ac-, 
cordingly, that is, I'lhe one wearied. And fo, he 
adds^ Bilhop Pearce underftood the force of this 
adverb. I think he is clearly right. 

I cannot help noticing alfo from Mr. Harmer^^ 
in reference to the time of the day^ that he fays.> 
Haynes, travelling from Cana to Nazareth, in the 
depth of winter, about the end of December, 
found many women aifembled at a fouiit^in to 
6 2 draw 



20 



draw water^ at Jive in the afternoon. Mr. Harmer, 
it mufh be obferved, leans to the other interpreta- 
tion of the hour. 

And it was about the fixih hour, John iv. 6. 

This Mr. Townfon underftands of fix in the 
evening. From i Sam. ix. ii, 12. and from Gen. 
xxiv. II. he fhews^ that the times, when the wo- 
men went out to draw water, were the morning 
and evening, not the noon, which was the lixth 
hour in the Jewifli and Roman day. The even- 
ing feems alfo to have been one of the cuftomary 
times in ancient Greece, for which Mr. Townfon 
refers to the OdylTey, lib. vii. ver. 19. 

But Mr. Parkhurft thinks, that the circum». 
fiance of the Samaritan woman's coming alone ra- 
ther lignifies, that fhe came at an iinufual hour, 
and this might be humility in her, from a confci- 
oufnefs of her own immoral charadler. Yet the 
fequel of the ftory does not fliew her to have been 
fo anxious to avoid public notice, lince fhe went 
into the city, and brought out the inhabitants to 
fee a man who had told her all things that ever 
fhe did. Neither do the motives affigned for her 
condu61: by Mr, Parkhurfl make it neceflary or 
probable, that, to avoid the general concourfe of 
the women of the city, fhe Ihould have deviated 
from the cuftom. of others, fb far as to go at noon, 
inftead of evening. She would more probably 

have 



21 



have gone a little earlier y or a Utile later ^ than the 
reft ; and about fix in the evening (in November 
or December, as it probably was) would be a little 
later than the general time at that feafon of the 
year. Add to this tv>^o circumftances, which feem 
decilive, though Mr. Townfon does not take no- 
tice of either. Jefus fat upon the well to reft 
himfelf, heing wearied with his journey. This im- 
plies that his day's journey was finifhed. Other- 
wife, if he only halted in the midft of his journey 
at noon, his faintnefs from the heat, or duft, or 
fome accidental caufe, would naturally have been 
affigned as the reafon for his refting himfelf. The 
Difciples too were gone away into the city to buy 
meat''' Now the evening, and not the noon, was 
the time of eating meat among the ancient Jews^ 
as well as Romans. 

Jofephus, indeed, in his life, informs us, that on 
the fahhath the Jews eat their a^tc-rov at noon. But 
what was the hour on other days ? And ftill that 
was not the principal meal, fuch as feems to be 
here intended. 

Say not ye^ There are yet four months, and then 
Cometh harvejl? John iv. 35. 
From hence Mr. Pilkington coUedls, that this 
was faid in December, about four months before 
the paffover, when the Jews began their harveft. ' 
Sir Ifaac Newtc^ thought the fame. But others 
c 3 ' fup- 



22 



fuppofe this to have been no more than a prover- 
bial expreffion, without reference to the a6tual fea- 
fon. Tillemont notices both opinions, and feems 
to incane to the latter. 

From that time Jefus began to preach, &c. 

Matt. iv. 17. 

The harmonizers of the Gofpels are much per- 
plexed to reconcile the order of St. Matthew's 
narration with that of St. Mark's, and both again 
with that of St. Luke's; from Matthew iv. 17/ 
Mark i. 15. Luke iv. 31. down to Matthew xviii. 
7. Mark ix. 38, and Luke ix. 49. inclufive ; and 
they Teem to me to be in general too ready to fur- 
render the authority of St. Matthew. They com- 
monly conlider him as purpofeiy negiedling the 
order of time^ and according to Chemnitius re- 
lating events, prout, data per unam aliquam nar- 
rationem occafione, memoriam didlorum et fa6to- 
rum Chrifti recordatione repetiit." Yet this will 
not folve all the difficulties, efpecially that relative 
to the cure of Jairus, Matt, ix. 18. Mark v. 22. 
and Luke viii. 41. Sir Ifaac Newton, on the 
other hand, thought that the true order was to be 
found in St. Matthew, and that St. Maik and St. 
Luke Hiouid be made to accord with him. I can- 
not myfelf abfoiutely agree with either opinion. 
St. Matthew diftin(9:ly marks the period of his 
pwn call : I cannot but fuppofe, that he was likely 

to 



23 



to be moft accurate in the placing of thofe events 
which immediately followed, as they would in all 
probability make the moft lively impreffion on 
his memory. I would therefore take him for the 
guide from that time to the beheading of the Bap- 
tift. It feems alfo reafonable to conclude, that 
what he puts before his own call might not have 
happened precifely in the order in which it is re- 
lated. And for that part I would prefer the au^ 
thority of St. Mark, who is reported to have 
written from the inftru6lion of St. Peter, one of 
the Difciples jirji called, and who, in regard to the 
miraculous cure of his own mothcr-in-law, and 
other events foon after his own call, muft be pre- 
fumed to be more corredl than St. Matthew. 
They who contend for a degree and kind of in- 
fpiration, incompatible with the flighteft dif- 
eordance among the Evangelifts in fuch fubordi- 
nate points as the order of events, will find infu- 
perable difficulties in their way. I do not know 
any palTage in Scripture which requires us to be- 
lieve that the teftimony of the Spirit, fpeaking 
through the facred penmen, was to exclude human 
teftimony. The promife of Chrift in his laft con- 
verfation feems to me to be of a different kind : 
John XV. 26, 27. The Spirit of truth y which pro* 
ceedeth from the Father, Jhall bear witne/s of me» 
And YE alfo JhaJl hear witnefs, hecaufe ye have 
heen with vie from the heginning. So, when after 
c 4 his. 



24 



his refurredlion he gives his final commiffion to 
his Difciples^ having reminded them of his former 
difcourfes, and opened their underftandings to ap- 
ply the Scriptures to the fadls of his hfe, he fays, 
u4nd YE are witnejfes of thefe things^ Luke xxiv. 
48. Hence, when an Apoftle was to be ele6led 
in the room of Judas, the qualification required 
was a perfonal kno%vledge of Chrift's miniflry from 
the beginning. They were, therefore, to bear wit- 
nefs as men, though the Spirit of truth alfo was to 
bear witnefs in them and through them, not con- 
trolling their teflimony according to its proper na- 
ture, but fuperadding his own agreeably to its di- 
vine charadler. 

In weighing human teflimony, they, whofe pro- 
feffion it is to confider the fubjedl with the nicefb 
accuracy, hold the confent of witnefTes on efTential 
points to be doubly ftrong, where there is fome 
flight variation in the account of minute circum- 
ftances. Courts of juftice fufpedl men, who, com- 
ing to prove any fa6^:, tell in nearly the fame lan- 
guage a tale in every part precifely the fame. 
This, inftead of a prefumption favourable to a 
•caufe fo fupported, affords only an indication of 
concert and confpiracy. Why then fhould we 
fuppofe, that the divine wifdom w^ould have re- 
courfe to the miracle of a conftant, overruling, in- 
fallible infpiration, fo as to allow no room for hu- 
man inaccuracy of obfervation, or human infir- 
mity 



25 



mity of memor}% in the mereft trifles, in order to 
produce compoiitions^ which for that very reafon 
could hardly obtain belief without another miracle ? 
Or why mufi: we talk our imaginations for con- 
jedlures and fuppolitions of every kind, rather than 
admit, that, recording at a confiderable diftance of 
time fome out of m.any remarkable difcourfes and 
a6lions, which palTed during a period of three, 
four, or five years, each of the Evangelifts in fome 
inftances (and they are ahnoji miraculoiijly few) 
may have been erroneous in the chronological or- 
der, which they may have affigned to fadls, wherein 
they all fubftantially agree? Is not the operation 
of the Spirit of truth fufficiently difcernible in this 
w^onderful refult of the whole, that there is no ar- 
ticle of our faith, no moral precept, no proof of 
Chrift's million by miracles, to be found in any 
one of the four, which the parallel palTages in the 
reft will overturn, or even impeach, though fome 
things may be qualified, limited, or explained by 
fuch a comparifon ? At moft they differ but little ; 
never to the injury, and altogether to the advan- 
tage of truth. 

^hen enquired he of them the hour when he hegan 
to amend ; and they fa 'id unto him, Yeflerday at 
the feventh hour the fever left hhn, 

John iv. 52. 
as this one in the day, ox fevejt in the evening f 

Mr. 



26 



Mr. Townfon contends, that it could not have 
been the former. Cana, where Jefus was, and Ca- 
pernaum, according to the map prefixed to Dr. 
White's Diateflaron, are not more than twenty five 
miles dillant in a ftraight hne from each other. 
No geographers place them more than an ordinary 
day's journey afunder. Can it be fuppofed then, 
that a fond parent, animated with the hope of find- 
ing a dying fon reftored to health, would not have 
fet off inftandy, if it was only one o clock f and if 
he had, he might have arrived the fame evening. 
But it was already dark at /even in the evenings as 
this was in December or January. 

And Jefus ^ walking hy the fea of Galilee^ faw tw@ 
men, Simon called Peter, and Andrew his bro- 
ther, &c. Matt, iv. 18. and Mark i. 16. 

Dr. Lightfoot makes Luke v. i— 11. to be a 
point of hiftory correfponding with this, obferving 
that St. Luke relates the call of thefe Difciples 
in a fuller manner, and gives the miracle of the 
.fifhes, which was performed at the fame time. 

Moft of the harmonifts agree with Dr. Light- 
foot. Calvin, upon occalion of this pafTage, in- 
troduces a general obfervation, of which we ought 
never to lofe fight. " Hoc," fays he, Evan- 
geliftis non infolens partem unam rei geftae, multis 
circumilantiis omiffis, attingere." 



And 



27 



And forthwith^ when they were come out of the 
fynagogue^ they entered Into the houfe of Simon 
and Andrew. Mark i. 29. 
St. Mark is very precife as to the day ; and in 
every thing, which perfonally regards the hiftory 
of St. Peter, he is the beft authority, except that 
his lilence as to any one fadl is no impeachment 
whatever of the other Evangehfls. From that 
humiUty, which is one of the firft of Chriftian 
virtues, he records lefs to the glory of St. Peter, 
than ahnoft any other of the facred penmen. 

For an angel went down at a certain feafon into the 
fooly and troubled the water : whofoever then^ 
jirft after the troubVmg of the water ^ flepped itiy 
was made whole of whatever difeafe he had, 

John V. 4. 

This verfe is wanting in feveral MSS. of high 
authority, and in others is marked with an afte- 
rilk, or an obelus. I am incUned very much to 
fufpedl it. Some commentators have tranflated 
ayyexoc, a meffenger, a prieft deputed for that fer- 
vice from the temple. They felt the difficulty of 
this fbanding miracle for the Jews. Semler, Mi- 
chaelis, and Griefbach agree in rejedling this verfe. 
Michaehs thinks, from internal evidence, that it 
was originally written in fome of the Oriental lan^ 
guages. 

But 



28 



But I fay unto you, that whofoever hoketh on a 
vooman to lujl after her, hath committed adultery 
tvith her already in his heart. Matt. v. 28. 

O^3-067.,aa;y x.parfi, he mafier of your eyes, was the 
iDeautiful and comprehenlive apophthegm of Pe- 
fiander of Corinth, one of the feven fages of 
Greece. It was the more appolite and forcible, 
as having been dehvered in a city noted for luxury 
and diflblute manners. 

Do not even the puhlicans fo f Be ye therefore per~ 
fe6f, eve?i as your Father which is in heaven is 
ferfeB. Matt. v. 47, 48. 

From the feeming jingle in Greek between teAu- 
i>a.it publicans, and tikim, perfect, Wetftein argues^ 
that St. Matthew originally wrote his Gofpel in 
that language, and not in Hebrew. And Dr. 
Lardner adopts the argument. But it is at once 
overthrown by the reading of Griefbach, who, on 
the authority of thirteen MSS. fome among them 
of high antiquity and the belt repute, as well as of 
eleven of the old veriions, reads sS-vixc;, heatheiiy 
inftead of T£;/x->at, puhlicans. 

I'he text was not improbably corrupted for the 
fake of the jingle. Befides, if the commonly re- 
ceived text be genuine, yet the fimilarity of found 
muft have been merely accidental. Whether St. 
Matthew wrote originally in Greek or in Hebrew, 

thefc 



29 



thefe words in the Greek text muft be equally ^ 
tranflation from the Hebrew or Syriac, For they 
are part of a difcourfe delivered by Chrift, cer- 
tainly not in Greek, but in the vulgar Hebrew or 
Syriac. 

Therefore, when thou doeft thy alms, do not found 
a trumpet before thee. Matt. vi. 2. 
Some commentators underlland this literally, 
and fome figuratively, and fome fuppofe o-aXyri- 
^£iv to mean the making the money fingJe, in 
dropping it into the poor s box. But Sir J. Char- 
din in a MS. note tells us, that the Dervifes in the 
eaft now carry horns, which they not nnfrcquently 
blow, when alms are given them, in honour of the 
donor. Harmer's Obferv. vol. i. p. 474. 

After this manner, therefore, pray ye. Matt. vi. 9. 

Dr. Lightfoot and others have fhewn, that Chrift 
in this prayer has adopted many Hebrew forms 
of petition ; and with great wifdom and propriety, 
as Koecher has obferved from Schoettgen : for our 
Saviour was now folemnly promulgating to Jews 
his new difpenfation, which v/as not to deftroy, 
but to fulfil, the law and the prophets. 

Our Father, who art in the hea'vens, was an He- 
brew ftyle of addrefling God, and highly proper 
therefore to be taught to thofe who heard him. 
According to the befi: MSS. of St. Luke xi. 2, 

Chrifl 



30 



Chrift taught his own Difciples to fay limply 
Father." 

Ev TOij ou^avoi?5 in the heavens. The Scripture 
viling different expreffions in different places, as 
heaven y the heavens^ and the heave^is of the heavens^ 
Mr. E. King, in his Morfels of Criticifm, thinks, 
that the diftindlion fnould always be preferved in 
the tranflation ; and I agree. His illuft ration 
from Mr. HerfcheFs late difcoveries and theory 
of the nebulous fbars is ingenious, and deferves at- 
tention. 

The claufe, thy will he done, he, is not in the 
beft MSS. of Luke. It may in one fenfe be 
underftood to be comprehended in the preceding. 
The will of God cannot but be done in hts kingdom^ 
and wherever his name is truly hallowed. Here 
the claufe may have been retained by our Saviour 
for the fuller edification of his hearers. There 
it was not equally necelTary. 

Inftead of this day, St. Luke has day hy day^^ 
or every day. The phrafe, which is tranflated daily 
Iread, is the fame in both. But mouo-ios does' 
not mean dmly ; it rather means to morrow. 
Koecher reckons up above twenty -four different 
tranflations or paraphrafes of it. Some derive it 
from £7rt and ouo-t^i-. ; and others, more truly in my 
opinion, from yj HTiioucra, which, as Jortin remarks, 
Euripides in his Medea, 352, ufes to fignify to 
morrovj. ^iriowiQ^ is no where to be found, but 

in 



31 



In this prayer. It may^ however, have been a 
word in vulgar afe, regularly derived from n sTnova-oi,^ 
the Greek not having, as the Enghlli has not, any 
claffical adjective for craftinus. We learn from 
Jerome, that the Gofpel according to the Hebrews 
fo underftood this word, and the old Scholia in- 
terpret iKiQ^jdiQ'j by Tov STTtoyTa, 'H STTtouca is ufed 
A6ls xxi, 8. 

Debts, oipiXni/.(x,roi, mean Jins, for which we are 
fubje^ to punijhment. The 14th and 15 th verfes 
fhew this claufe to have been of principal im- 
portance in the benevolent purpofes of oar Sa^ 
vioun 

But deliver us from evil is not in St. Luke^ 
From the evil one is Mr. E. King's tranflation, 
as well as that of Bengelius, and many others 
before him. Bengelius too obferves, that the heavens 
and heaven in this prayer ought to be diftinguifh- 
ed, though he thinks the different numbers are 
promifcuoufly ufed in Matt. xxii. 30. and xxi v. 
36. Yet even there, in Matt, xxii, 30. is apoffible 
diftindlion between the angels of heaven, fpeak- 
ing of mans refurredlion, and the angels of the 
heavens^ in Matt. xxiv. 36. The doxology is in 
none of the more ancient MSS, 



More- 



32 



Moreover, when ye faft, he not as the hypocrites, of 
a fad countenance, for they disfigure their faces. 

Matt. vi. 1 6. 
Disfigure their faces ^ aipcivi^Q'ja-i, literally, make to 
dlfap'pear, remove out of fight \ and thence Wol- 
fius, Parkhurft, and others, with our tranflators^, 
underfland the word disfigure, or make to look 
difmal hy whatever meayis. Yet Wetftein tranflates 
it tegunt^ cover, hide, or conceal ; and others agree 
with him. But all remark the paronomafia of 
ajpavt^oLCi OTTW? ^avwcri. This paronomalia^ which is 
admired by Parkhurft, Wetftein, and, among 
others, Dr. Lardner, whatever may be its intrinfic 
elegance or not, will not fupport the argument 
which they draw from it, to fhew that St. Mat- 
thew originally wrote in Greek. The fame objec- 
tion will apply here, as to a limilar argument from 
ch. V. 47, 4.8. upon which fee the remark p. 28. 
Whatever beauty there may be in the antithefis of 
the fenfe, according to Wetftein's interpretation_, it 
may be preferved almofh in every language. In 
our own ,we may preferve even the play of the 
words, thus, for they cover their faces, that they 
may be difcovered by men to fall." This is even 
more perfe6l than the Greek itfelf; and, purfuing 
the argument of Wetftein and Lardner, future 
fcholars might contend, that St. Matthew muft 

from 



33 



from this pafTage have written in EngJiJh, it our 
tranflators had fo rendered it. 

Lay not up for yourf elves treafures upon earthy 
where moth and riift doth corrupt. Matt. vi. 19. 

Corrupt^ ci(pxv:^u : the metaphorical ufe of the 
verb in this place feems to confirm the fenfe put 
upon it by our tranflators in v. 16; and its intro- 
dudlion here^ where there is no jingle^ feems to 
fhew that the paronomafia there belongs to the 
critics, and not the Evangelift. 

Therefore all things whatfoev-er ye woidd that men 
Jhoidd do to you ^ do ye even fo to them \for this Is 
the law and the "prophets. Matt. vii. 12. 

Wetilein has colledled many paiTages from 
heathen writers^ which exprefs fomething of the 
fame fentiment with this divine precept. He has 
omitted, however, a faying attributed to Cleobu- 
lus of Lindus, one of the feven fages of Greece ; 'O 
c-u fjAo-iig, £T£^w fxri HQi-ncryi;, Do not to another^ zvhat 
you diff ike yourf elf . And a fimilar faying of Thales^ 
the Mileiiau;, 'Oo-» 

X)o not thofe things^ for which you are angry with 
your neighbour. But the neareft of any thing is 
undoubtedly the ftory of R. Hillel, which Wet- 
ftein, after others^ relates from the Talmud. When 
a heathen promifed to become his prgfelyte, if he 
would teach him the whole Jewiih law at one 

B leffon^ 



34 



leiron, he faid, Do not to another what you would 
not like to he do?ie to yourfelf. This is the whole 
Jaw : the reji is hut comment. It fhould however 
be recolledled^ that, although R. Hillel fiourifhed 
before the time of our Saviour, this anfwer is only 
attributed to him in the Talmud, a compilation of 
a fubfequent date, and perhaps written long after 
the Emperor Alexander Severus had caufed this 
very precept of our Saviour to be infcribed every 
where on the walls of his palace. The Jews very 
probably did what the Deifts of modern times 
have done. They may have pillaged the pure 
morality of the Chriftians, with the fraudulent pur- 
pofe of arrogating to their own do6lrines, a merit, 
which did not belong to them. 

He /pit, and touched his tongue ; and looking up to 
heaven^ he Jighed, Mark vii. 33, 34. 

It was a great crime and abomination among the 
Jews to /pit or zvhifper words into a wound, as 
Schoetrgen in his Hor. Heb. v. i. p. 247, ob- 
ferves, and perhaps to do the fame over any dif- 
eafed part. It is not improbable therefore, that 
Jefus may have ufed thefe very ceremonies for the 
parpofe of refifting fuch idle prejudices, founded 
perhaps on the notion of magic. Without fome 
fuch motive of divine wifdom, it might have been 
fufficient for our Lord to have put his ha?id upon 
the deaf and dumb man, as his friends had prayed, 

or 



35 



or to have cured him, as others had been repeat- 
edly cured, by a word. 

Where their worm d'leth not^ and the fire is not 
quenched. Mark. ix. 44. 
This verfe and alfo the 46th are not to be found 
in feveral of the belt and moft ancient MSS. 
Some few omit alfo the 45th verfe. 

Thou Jhalt love thy neighbour as thyfelf. 

Luke X. 27. 

It was a faying of Thales the Milefian, A^aTra 
Tov TTATio-iov, Love thy neighbour \ and of Cleobulus, 

and protect what belongs to thy neighbour as thine 
own. Wetftein has not any parallel paffages from 
Heathen or Jewifh writers. 

And Jefus anfwered and fiiid unto them, For the 
hardnefs of your heart he wrote you this precept. 

Mark x. 5. 

The prepofition in the original is tt^o?, not J^i<%, 
It is true, that the former is fometimes ufed for 
the latter ; but its more appropriate lignification 
points rather to an eite6l, than a caufe, as its lim- 
ple meaning is to or towards. This would give a 
much better fenfe ; To the hardening of your 
hearts he wrote you this precept a reproach to 
the Pharifees for their perverlion of the law ; not 
D 2. an 



36 



an Impeachment of the law itfelf, as a compromife 
with the evil difpofition of the Jews, 

And if a woman Jhall put away her hujband, and 
he married to another^ Jhe comm'itteth adultery, 

Mark x. 12. 

This cafe of a woman divorcing her huiband is 
not put by St. Matthew. It was not common 
among the Jews. Salome^ the lifter of Herod the 
great, was the firfi: who is recorded to have done it. 
This may be the reafon why Chrill only noticed 
the point privately " in the houfe" to his Difci- 
ples ; and why St. Matthew did not preferve it, as 
h-e wrote for the Jews. But St. Mark wrote for the 
JRomans, among whom the cuftom was fo fre- 
quent, as to be a principal topic of their fatirills 
againft the female fex. 

As to the private notice of the cafe of a wo- 
man divorcing her huiband, I muft add, that the 
reigning queen Herodias had fo done, and St» 
John the Baptifh had been beheaded for his cen- 
fure of her adultery. Chrifh throughout his mini-r 
llry avoided all unnecelTary irritation of the ruling 
powers till the pafibver^ when he knew that his 
hour was come. 



hi 



37 



In the Iqfi day^ that great day of the feaft^ Jefus 
Jiood and eried^ ^^^J thirji^ Jet him 

€omi unto me and drink, John ni. 37, 
Our Saviour is fuppofed here to allude to a 
ceremony obferved in his time by the Jews, at the 
feaft of Tabernacles^ that of 'pouring out vcater 
with great folemnity^ the objedl of which was to 
obtain from God the rains of autumn. " Bring 
the libation of water/' fays Rabbi Akibah^ accord- 
ing to Dr. Lightfoot, at the feaft of Taber- 
nacles, that the fhowers may be blelTed to thee : 
and accordingly it is faid, (Zech. iv. 17.) that who- 
foever will not come to the feaft of Tabernacles 
fhall have no rain." See Harmefs Obfervations, 
vol. iii. Obf. 2. 

Jefus ivent Into the Mount of Olives. 

John viii. i. 

The firfl eleven verfes of this chapter of Sr. John 
are wanting in many of the beft and oldefh MSB. 
They are marked in fome with afcerifks, and in 
others with an obelus ; and Vv'here they are found, 
they differ more in various readings, than any 
equal number of other verfes throughout the 
Gofpel. So that on the whole I do not think the 
paffage can be fairly conlidered as authendc, Poffi- 
bly it may have crept in, as fome critics have fug- 
gefted^j from fome of the early colledlions relative 

B 3 to 



38 



to the life of Chrifl, to which St. Luke alludes in 
his preface. From a quotation in Eufebius, who 
relates from Papias, that, hi the Go/pel according 
to the Hebrews, there was a ftory of a woman 
accufcd of many crim.es before Chrift, this is fup- 
pofed by fome to have been the fourcc of the 
paffage in queftion. But Tillemont (Memoir, 
tom. i. p. 275. ed. Bruffels, 1732.) obferves, that 
the woman here is accufed but of one crime, and 
not of 77ia7iy, BengeUus, however, ( A.pp. Crit.) 
truly fays, that, whether the ftory cited by Eufe- 
bius from Papias be the fame or different, this pa- 
ragraph will neither be eftabliilied nor deftroyed 
by that circumftance either way. The quotation 
from Papias through Eufebius is to be found in 
Fabricius's Codex Apoc. tom i. p. 356, and a 
long note on the fubjeci of this palTage in the 
common editions of St. John's Golpel ; from 
which I fhall remark only, that he objedls to the 
argument ufed by Til lemon t, as previoufly urged 
by Baronius, that the w^oman taken in adultery 
might be accufed of many other crimes of the fame 
kind. 

One m.ode of accounting for the omiffion of the 
paflage in m.any MSS. is, that it was purpofely 
retrenched, left it m.ight have a bad efFecSl: on fe- 
male m.orals. But this will not explain why it was 
omitted in this place, and yet added at the end \ 
by fome in other parts of St. John, and by others, 

ia 



39 



in St. Luke. Neither can it be fuppofed, that for 
fuch a reafon (firft intimated by St. Auguftin as 
a fuppolition of his own, De Adult. Conjug. lib. ii. 
c. 7.) it would be palTed over by fo many different 
commentators and expofitors^ by Origen, Nonnus^ 
Theophylact, Chryfoftom, Eufebius^ Cyril of 
Alexandria^ Leontius, the twenty-three commxenta- 
tors to be found in the Greek Catena, publifned 
by Corderius^ and thofe in another Catena MS. 
mentioned by Father Simon. Hiftor. Crit. N. T. 
lib. iii. p. 435. Tatian in his Harmony inferted 
it, and he is thought by fome to have ufed for the 
purpofes of his com.pilation, not only the four 
Evangelifts. but alfo the Gofpel according to the 
Hebrews^ which v;as anciently received as genuine 
by many of the Fathers, and which Epiphanius, 
(Haeref. 46.) by a ftrange carelefsnefs, confounds 
with the DiatefTaron, and afcribes in confequence 
to Tatian. Or poffibly he ufed that as the tnie 
Gofpel of St. Matthew, which fome others alfo 
efteemied it to be. 

If this be the origin of the ftory. it by no means 
follows that it was not true. The Gofoel accord- 
ing to the Hebrews was not only had in efteem, 
as there ftated, but was undoubtedly one of the 
m.oft ancient, lince it was quoted by Papias. It 
may, therefore, have contained many true pafTages 
of the life of Chrift, though more falfe and per- 
verted narratives. This being not-iced by Papias, 

D 4 and 



40 



and finally fandlioned by the Churchy ought to be 
received as true, whether it really came from that 
origin, or from the higher authority of St John. 

Wetflein rejedls the paragraph, and Griefbach, 
by the way in which he points it with the various 
readings of different MSS. furnifhes the ftrongefi: 
and almoft intuitive evidence againfh it. But 
Michaelis admires and defends it, admitting the 
truth of Augufiiin's fuppofition, as a principal 
ground of his opinion. His tranflator, Marfli, re- 
fers to Griefbach. On reconlideration, I do not 
fee any reafon to alter my own opinion^, as it is 
above exprefTed. 

And Jefus was left alone, and the woman Jlayiding 
in the m'ldji, John viii. 9. 

^^(j^'^ici, in the befh of thofe copies which have 
this iftory. But is not i!Tro:(j(x, a participle of the 
perfect tenfe^ Jhe who had Jiood, or^ more literally, 
having Jiood ? Other copies have no participle at all 
in this place^ but fimply the woman in the 
midft." 

When he had thus fpoJcen, he fpat on the ground, 
and made clay of the fpittle, and he anointed the 
eyes of the blind maii with the clay, John ix. 6. 

Jefus often exercifed his divine pov.^er by a touch 
or a W'ord. Why then did he on this occafion 
ufe the ceremonies here defcribed ? The queftion 

feems 



41 



feems to have fuggefted itfelf to many interpreters, 
and to have laid them under fome difficulty. It 
appears, however, to m.e, that our Lord a6led thus 
purpofely to mark a flronger oppolition to the 
vain and afiedled fuperftitions of the Rabbies. 
He had early difregarded and lilenced their ob- 
jedlions to healing on the fabbath-d^y. Now he 
chofe a particular mode of healing, which w^as a 
new flight of their traditions. For by them it was 
exprefsiy forbidden to anomt the eyes on the fah- 
hath-day. See Lightfoot, Doddridge, and New- 
come. It was alfo forbidden to apply fpittle to a 
wound, or difeafed part, probably from fome no- 
tion of forcery in fuch an application. See remark 
on Mark vii. 33. p. 34. So the prefent cure af- 
failed at once two prejudices of the Jews. The 
phrafeology of the fourteenth verfe favours this re- 
mark. 

And It was at Jeriifalem the feajl of the Dedication^ 
and It was winter. John x. 22. 

Three of the principal MSS. which follow the 
ancient Alexandrian revifion, ufed by Origen, Cle- 
mens, Eufebius, Athanafius, and others, read rorf, 
infi:ead of h. It was then at Jerufalem, &c. inftead 
of and it was, ccc. The Coptic tranflation and 
one Latin copy feem to read tot?, and nine 
MSS. have neither of the particles. Thefe varia- 
tions, and efpecially the very high authority of the 

three 



42 



three MSS. firft mentioned^ favour the notion of 
thofe Harmonifts, who fuppofe the meeting of 
Jefus with the blind man, whom he had cured, 
and the Elders had excommunicated, to have 
taken place when he returned to Jerufalem, to be 
prefent at the feafl: of the Dedication. After having 
been obliged to hide himfelf, that he might efcape 
ftoning, it is not likely that he Ihould appear again 
at Jerufalem, till he went thither to attend the next 
public feilivaL And we find from Luke, that he 
came on this occaiion out of Galilee. 

Then took Mary a found of ointment of fpikejiard, 

John xii. 3. 

A pounds XtT^av. There has been much difcuf- 
lion about the origin and precife meaning of this 
word. It feems, howe^'er, to have meant a weight 
of twelve ounces, or thereabout, or about a pound 
of our Troy weight. 

A certain man planted a vineyard, and fet an hedge 
about it^ and digged a place for the winefat, and 
huilt a tower. Mark xii. i. 

Built a tozver. Mr. Harmer fhews (vol. ii. p. 
24.1.) that to this day, in the Eaft. towers are fre- 
quently ere6led in fuburban gardens, and in diflant 
vineyards, as places of refuge in the event of a fur- 
prife and fudden attack from enemies, or robbers. 

They 



43 



They are alfo not feldom built for ornament and 
pleafure. 

Go ye therefore into tJie highways, and as many as 
ye Jhall find, hid to the marriage. Matt. xxii. 9. 

Mr. Harmer fhews (vol. ii. p. 125, 126.) that 
an Arab prince, even now, will often dine in the 
ftreet, before his door^ and invite all that pafs, ev-en 
heggars, in the ufual expreffion of Bifmillah, that 
is, in the name of God. 

And Jefus anfijcered him. The firfi of all the com- 
mandments is, Hear, Jfrael ; the Lord our God 
is one Lord : And thou Jhalt lo've the Lord thy 
God with all thy heart, and with all thy foul ^ and 
with all thy mind, and with all thy fireyigth, 

Mark xii. 29, 30. 

The Jews^ as Maimonides relates, according to 
an ancient cuftom firfi: eilablifhed by Ezra, are 
bound to repeat, at leaft twice every day, what is 
ufually termed the Jhemah, which confifts in the 
recitation of three feveral pafTages of Scripture ; the 
firft, Deuteronomy vi. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 ; the fecond, 
Deuteronomy xi. 19, 20, 21, 22; and the third, 
Numbers xv. 37, 38, 39, 40, 41. See Vitringa de 
Synagoga, lib. iii. p. 2. c. 15. The commence- 
ment of this Jhemah is the very paiTage here ad- 
duced by our Saviour. There feems, therefore, 
much propriety in the introduction of it on this 

occa- 



44 



Gccafion^ when the Scribes and Pharifees were en» 
Jeavouring, by public queftions, to implicate him 
in fome anfwer^ which might make him obnoxious, 
either to the pjsople^ or the Romans. 

Then /pake Jefus to the multitude , and to his difci- 
pies. Matt, xxiii. i. 

This long difcourfe, full of the moft beautifully 
fevere eloquence againft the Scribes and Pharifees, 
tontrafted with the Ihort extra6ls of Mark and 
Luke, upon the fame fubjedi:, pointedly indicates 
the different deiigns^ with which the Evangelifcs 
ivrote^ and the perfons to whom they addreiTed 
their Gofpels. Matthew preferves the particulars, 
\vhich muft have been interefting to the Jews. 
The two other facred Hiftorians have concifely 
fele^led jufl as much as might ferve to convey a 
general moral ledlure againft pride and hypocrify. 
St. Luke, indeed, has preferved much of a limilar 
difcourfe upon another occalion, xi. 37, &c. but 
ftill not iO full of Jewifli manners as this. 

But whofoever Jhallfwea7- hy the gold of the temple^ 
he is a debtor. lb. 16. 

It fhould rather be tranilated, he is engaged, or 
he is bound, that is by his oath ; or, as is the more 
general fenie of the word o<p£iMi, and as the very 
fame word is tranflated at the end of the eighteenth 
verfe^ he is guilt}'. But the moil accurate tranfla- 

tion. 



45 



tion^ in point of meaning, is that v/hich I have. 
aboTe fuggefled. 

But the wife tool oil in their vejfels with their 
lamps. Matt. xxv. 4. 

Sir J. Chardin^ in a MS. note on this paffage^ 
informs us, that in many parts of the Eaft, and in 
particular in the Eaft Indies, inftead of torches and 
flambeaux, they carry a pot of oil in one hand^ 
and a lamp full of oily rags in the other. Harmer^ 
Tol. ii. p, 431. 

And being in Bethany in the houfe 0f Simon the 
leper, as he fat at meat, there came a woman 
having an alahajier box of ointment of fplkenard, 
very precious ; arul fhe brake the box, and poured 
it on his head, Mark xiv. 3. 

The breaking of the box (the commientator$ 
have obferved) was unufual, unneceffary, and m.uft 
have been inconvenient to the divine perfon, who 
was meant to be honoured. Some, therefore, have 
underftood a mere fhahng of the box by g-uvt^j- 
\}^a(7a. But that word in the befb authors has a 
much greater force. Mr. Harmer, (vol. iv. p. 470.) 
I am fatisfied, has found the true m.eaning. She- 
broke the cement^ with which the mouth and ftop- 
ple of the vefTel were fecured, as ftill is the cufl:om 
in the Eafii, to prevent the evaporation of their 
perfumes. And he fhevv's what certainly muit be 

under- 



46 



underflood to be a fimilar phrafe of Proper- 
tius, 

FraBo bufta piare cado. 

It may be added, that one of Griefbach's Latin 
MSS. has aperiens, opening ; which proves, at lealt, 
the underftanding of the copyifr to have been H- 
milar to the explanation fuggefied by Mr. Har- 
mer. I vv'ould propofe to place a comma after 
o-uvrpiij/ac-a, and tranflate the paliage thus : And 
having broken open, fhe poured out the alabaiter 
box on his head." So we fay, to pour out a 
bottle, a pitcher, or a cup, when we mean to ex- 
prefs the pouring out of their feveral contents. 

And flipper being ended. John xiii. 2. 

Perhaps rather '^fupper being ferved," or, " hav- 
ing been ferved." 

Verily^ verily^ I fay unto thee^ The cock fnall not 
crow, till thou hafl denied me thrice. Ibid. 38. 

In confirmation of Mr. Townfon's arguments, 
that St. John reckons his days and hours diiFe- 
rently from the other Evangelifts, it may be ob- 
ferved, that he is the only one of the four, wllo 
does not here add this day, or this night. It was 
the fame day or night, according to their com- 
putation, but not according to his. It was fome 
time after furfety and before midiught. 

And 



47 



Atld I will pray the Father, and he JhaJl give ym 
another comforter, John xiv. 1 6. 

Comforter^ TraoaxXnTov. This appellation of the 
Holy Spirit is not happily tranflated, the comforter. 
It had a peculiar lignification^ and had been adopt- 
ed in the Hebrew language^ as had alio the oppo- 
lite word x.aTyiyo^o?. Mede on Revelations^ c. xii, 
ver. lo. quotes from Maimonides a palTage expla- 
natory of both words ; " Paraclit, Tra^axArro^^ dici- 
tur, qui interpelht in bonum pro homine apud re- 
gem, cujus contrarium eft : kategor, K^irriyo^o?, is 
enim eft, qui traducit hominem apud regem, et 
conatur occidere eum." 

Bengelius in his Gnomon remarks, that no 
writer of the New Teftament ufes this appellation, 
except St. John. He tranflates it advocatus, de- 
fenfor, patronus^ as 7rctpa>iaXf;y is advocare, arceftere 
patronum, qui pro aliquo dicat ; et ei dicenda 
fuggerat. Advocate, defender, patron^ or prqte^lor, 
is certainly nearer the meaning than conforter ; 
yet the office of the Paraclete, or Paraclit, as ex- 
plained by Maimonides, is of ftill higher dignity, 
and more fuitable to the Spirit of Grace, who alone 
renders all our actions acceptable to the King of 
Kings. St. John, in his firft Epiftle, c. ii. ver. i. 
calls Chrift himfelf our Tra^axAriTcv, which is there 
tranllated advocate. 



I will 



48 



I will not hcvmyoit comfortlefs, John xiv. i8. 

Opoai/ou^, orphans, deftitute^ children deprived of 
all protedtors. The word comfortlefs feems to 
have been chofen with reference to the miftranfla- 
tion of TTcx.^QLY.Xnroi, comforter. 

Verily, I fay unto thee, that this day, even in this 
night, hefore the cock crow twice, thou fhalt deny 
me thrice, Mark xiv. 30. 

The feeming difference of the Evangelifts here 
has been well explained. The fecond crowing of 
the cock was the period^ which was peculiarly 
called the cock crow-ing, and in regard to which 
St. Mark has before fhewn his accuracy, c. xiii. 

35* Thus underftood, hefore the cock crow, 
or hefore the cock crow twice, means exactly the 
fame. 

And there appeared an angel unto him from heaven, 
f^rengthening him: And heing in an agony, he 
prayed more earneflly : and his fweat was as it 
were great drops of Mood falliiig down to the 
ground, Luke xxii. 43, 44. 

Thefe two verfes are wanting in the Alexandrian 
and Vatican MSS. of different reviiions, and both 
among the oldefl copies in three MSS. of another 
revilion, and of good authority, marked 13, 69, 
and 1 24 in Grieibach's Catalogue ; and are faid by 

the 



40 



the Scholiaft, in another^ to have been anciently 
omitted in feveral Latin as well as Greek copies. 
Seven difliinguilh them with an afterifk, and one 
with an obelus. Some of thefe MSS, and the 
Evangeliftaries in general leave them out in Luke, 
and infert them in Matthew. Finally, one of the 
Slavonic verfions omits them, and one marks them 
with an afterilk. It mufl: be obferved, that the 
fadl could not come from, any human teftimony ; 
for Jefus had retired to fome diftance from the 
great body of his difciples, and his three attendants 
were afleep. I think the palTage very dubious. 
The prayer, which is fhort, might naturally have 
been heard by Peter, James, and John, before they 
fell afleep. 

It may Hkewife be remarked, that while the 
MSS. and Evangel iftaries, which have the paffage, 
infert it, fome in the Gofpel of St. Matthew, and 
fome of St. Luke ; none ever afcribe it to St. 
Mark. But this Evangelift, writing under the 
immediate authority of St. Peter, one of the three, 
who alone could have feen the a^fearance (had 
there been any) of the angel, that came to 
ftrengthen Chrifi:, would have been the beft hu- 
man witnefs ; and Peter was not likely to have 
omitted fo ftriking a fa6l. This alFords an addi- 
tional argument for fufpedling the pafiage. 

Beiides, I confefs, that unlefs the facl be clear^ 
and authenticated by the fame evidence as the un- 
£ doubtedly 



50 



doubtedly genuine parts of the Gofpels, I cannot 
ealily reconcile myfelf to the miffion of an angel 
for the purpofe of llrengthening Chrift on this aw- 
ful occalion. That his birth fhould be foretold 
and celebrated by thefe heavenly meflengers ; that 
after his temptation they Ihould minifter unto 
him ; that it was in his difcretion to have com- 
manded a legion of them for his protection, in- 
ftead of two fwords in the hands of his difciples, if 
his own defence had then been his intention : fi- 
nally, that angels Ihould watch in his fepulchre, 
and announce his refufre6lion — all thefe things are 
agreeable to the due fubordination in which we 
mufh fuppofe the meflengers and minifters of God 
are to the Son. But to Jirengthen him to make 
that one full and perfedt facrifice and oblation of 
himfelf, which was the fole end of his coming into 
this world, appears to me not an office for any 
created fpirit. I think it more fubhme, and con- 
Hftent with the character of the divine fufFerer, to 
prefume, that after his fhort prayer, of more than 
human relignation, amidft all his mortal frailty 
and heavinefs of foul, he remained in lilent medi- 
tation and communion with the Father, who is al- 
ways one with the Son, and the Son with him^ 
who is always in the Son, and the Son in him. 



And 



51 



And he fat with the fervafitSj and warmed h'mifelf 
at the fire, Mark xiv. 54. 

It is (pwj in the original. The hlaze^ or the Maze 
of fir e^ or the blazing fire. The difference is not 
unimportant, as it was night, and the blaze was 
neceflary for the maid to look upon him. 

And a maid f aw him. again, lb. ^9. 

In all the MSS. it is r[ Ttiz Jjo-nr, the maid^ and not 
a maid, Grotius however obferves, that other 
writers, bcfides the Evangelilts, ufe the article to 
denote not a certain, but an uncertain^ perfon. 

Then Pilate therefore took Jefus, and fcourged him, 

John xix. J, 

Matthew and Mark feem to reprefent the fcourg- 
ing and the mocking otXhrift, by the foldiers, as an 
event fubfequent to the fentence, and a part of the 
capital punifhment, agreeably to a known Roman 
cuftom. But according to what is Ihortly inti- 
mated by St. Luke, I will chaftife him, and let 
him gOj" St. John reprefents the fcourging and 
the mocking, as a previous event, fometbing like a 
compromife of Pilate with the malignity of the 
Jews, followed by a new appeal to their feelings. 



And 



52 



And It 'was the preparation of the pajfover^ and 
about the fixth hour, John xix. 14. 

To make this verfe harmonize with Mark xr. 
15. many have propofed to read here the third 
hour. But, as Bengehus, who inclines to that ex- 
pedient himfelf, admits^ almoft all the MSS. and 
verfions are againft it. Grielbach places the emen- 
dation in his margin with the mark which de- 
notes, that he thinks it equal, if not preferable, to 
the received text, but cannot venture to pronounce 
the common reading fpurious. In fadl, the pro- 
pofed emendation is only fupported by lix MSS. 
one of which is Beza's Cambridge MS. the mofl 
licentious of all in reconciling difficulties ; three are 
of the common herd, (codices gregarii, as Grielbach 
calls them,) one of fecond rate, or rather third rate 
authority, and the remaining one alone of any 
conliderable repute. The critics who are oa 
that lide of the queftion appear to rely much 
upon an old author, quoted in the Alexandrian 
Chronicle, who appeals to a copy in the hand- 
writing of St. John himfelf, preferved at Ephefust 
but that author lived about the year 300; and no 
other writer previous to him mentions any fuch 
authentic copy, which from the great age of St. 
John, and the common cuflom of uling a fecreta- 
ry, is highly incredible. In truth, the alteration 
would only produce the mifciiief which it is de- 

figned 



53 



figned to remove. St. Mark fpeaks of the hour 
of the a<5lual crucifixion ; St. John^ of the hour of 
Pilate's paffing fentence^ which, by a moderate 
computation, as Mr. Townfon has fhewn in his 
Difcourfes on the four Gofpels, mufh have been 
three hours earlier. The third hour, with St, Mark, 
is nine in the morning, he naming the hours after 
the Jewifh and Roman mode : the lixth hour, with 
St. John, is fix in the morning, he and the Afiatic 
churches reckoning as we now do. 

Koecher reckons up five or fix other folutions^ 
^nd names the authors who refpe6lively patronize 
them. But I prefer this of Tov^mfon^ which I find 
by Koecher to have been formerly maintained by 
De Dieu, Wideburgius, Carpzovius, David Mi- 
chaelis, and Ittigius, except that they fuppofed it 
to be the Roman computation. 

That St. John reckoned his hours as we do, has 
been fuggefted by many, but oppofed Vv^ith fome 
fuccefs, becaufe it was erroneoufly faid to be the 
Roman way. The fa6l is, the Romans divided 
their vjyJiniAi^ov as we do, from midnight to mid- 
night, and not as the Jews did, from funfet to fun- 
fet ; but both reckoned the hours of the day from 
funrife to funfet. Mr. Townfon, however, has, in 
my opinion, very fadsfadlorily fhewn, from, an ex- 
amination of all the paffages, where St. John 
names or indicates the hour, that he reckoned pre- 
cifely as we do. He alfo produces fom.e authori- 
E 3 ties 



54 



ties to prove that this mode was alfo ufed by the 
churches of Alia. 

And it was the third hour, and they crucified him, 

Mark xv. 25 . 

Nonnus fays r^irocrYi S-avarn^po^o? co^n, which is 
adduced by BengeUus in favour of reading r^nvi for 
Ihtt), John xix. 14. But if a poet is to be under- 
ftood Hterally, he may be thought rather to agree 
with St. John. For Chrift expired about three 
o'clock in the afternoon, which is the ninth hour 
according to Matthew, Mark, and Luke; but the 
third, as Mr. Townfon thinks, according to St. 
John, and the modern mode of reckoning. Non- 
nus, however, in all probability referred, though a 
little inaccurately, to this palfage, and by the 
death meant the adbual crucifixion of our Saviour. 

Now there fiood by the crofs of Jefixs, his mother y 
and his mother s fifier, Mary the wife of Cleo- 
fhas^ and Mary Magdalene, John xix. 23. 

At this time Mary Magdalene and Mary the 
wife of Cleophas may have been with the Virgin 
by the crofs : but after this afFedtionate leave taken 
by our Lord, and efpecially after the death of their 
mafter, they might have joined the reft of the wo- 
men, who ftood afar off. 



Now 



55 



Now there was Jet a vejfel full of vinegar : and 
they filled a fpunge with vinegar, and put it upon 
hyffop, and put it to his mouth. John xix. 29. 

Our tranflators favour the interpretation, which 
fuppofes the hyffop to be the fame as the reed 
mentioned by Matthew and Mark. But many 
learned men feem to have been diffatisfied, and 
have therefore had recourfe to various conjedlures. 
Some would read uVo-wttov -Tfspi^cvrsg, putting hyffop 
round it, as if the fpunge was placed in a bundle of 
hyffop, and that upon the point of a reed men- 
tioned by Matthew and Mark, but omitted by 
John. Others would fubftitute oktuttov for uVo-wttov, 
putting raw wool round it: and it is remarked, that 
in Galen, ^gineta, Pliny, and Celfus, thefe two 
words are throughout fo confounded. Others 
again, for Jo-o-wttw propofe uVo-w(Jtw, on a little fpear, 
the wooden part of which they imagine to have 
been meant by Matthew and Mark, when they fay 
xaXa/xw. But a better conjedlure of this kind is 
uVcrw TTooTre^iS-svTf?. Griefbach has thought all thefe 
conjeAures worth preferving, although unfup- 
ported by the traces of any MS. But, as Park- 
hurft fays, after Wolfius and Salmaiius, there is a 
fort of hyffop with a reedy ftalk, two feet longj 
fufEcient for the purpofe. 



TU 



56 



The Jews therefore, hecaufe it was the preparation, 
that the bodies Jkould not remain on the crofs on 
the fabhathday, (for that fabbath-day was an 
high day,) John xix. 31. 

For the fakC;, probably, of greater perfpicuity, 
the order of the fentence is a httle changed in our 
tranflation. Becaufe it was the preparation/' is 
placed in the original immediately before the pa- 
rentheiis, whence in Bowyer we find a propofal for 
altering the pundluation^ fo as to make the fab- 
bath- day^ now in the parenthelis, depend on the 
word preparation." He would tranflate it then 
in this manner; Becaufe it was the preparation of 
the fabbath, for that (fabbath) was an high day.'' 
Bat more literally it would be^ " Becaufe it was 
the preparation (for that was a high day) of the 
fabbath." But that conftruclion would rather re- 
fer the defcription of being a high day to the day 
of the preparation, and not to the fabbath, which 
is contrary to the motive affigned for the applica- 
tion of the Jews, and the beft MSS. have £)c£tvoi3 
not £KEtv»i, that fabbath, not that day. 

And Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of Jo- 
fes, beheld where he was laid. Mark xv. 47. 

How comes Salome not to be mentioned here 
either by St. Matthew or St. Mark, though both 
had exprefsly named her jufl before ? She had 

naturally 



57 



naturally retired immediately after the death of 
Jefus, with his mother Mary, whom John took 
from that hour to his own home, 

j4nd there came aJfo JSicodemus^ which at the firji 
came to Jefus hy 7iight^ and Drought a mixture of 
myrrh, and aloes, ahout an hmidred ^ound 
'weight. John xix. 39. 

The quantity of fpices here mentioned has been 
thought to raife fo ferious a dilliculty, that Mark- 
land, in his notes on Iphig. in Tauris 495, at- 
tempts to cure it by a conjedlural emiendation of 
>.tTp? \y.xriD!j)v, a pound of each, inftead of Atr^a? 
Exaxov, an hundred pound. And Griefbach thinks 
this conjedlure worthy of a place among his vari- 
ous readings. But there is no variation among the 
MSS. and the ancient Fathers and tranflations. All 
uniformly read Uoltov ; and the facred text muft not 
be difturbed on conje6lure merely, however fpe- 
cious. Kypke, Lardner, and others, have fhewn, 
that the quantity itfelf is not more than was ufed 
in a fumptuous funeral. See Koecher, Parkhurft, 
ScC. But there is another objedlion, that Nicode- 
mus could not have carried an hundred pounds 
weight, and if he had brought it on an horfe or a 
mule, the word Ihould have been ciy^v, and not 
95pwv. However, if he carried fome, and his fer- 
vants the reft, the word ^^^cov would be fufiiciendy 
proper. 

And 



58 



And they returned^ and prepared fpices and o'lnt^ 
ments ; and refied the fahhath-day^ accordmg to 
the commajidment . Luke xxiii. 56. 

In my opinion, particularly on account of the 
immediate and clofe reference of the particles ,a£v — li^ 
the laft verfe of this chapter fhould be the firfh of 
the next, with a different divilion of the verfes. 

1 . Now after they had returned^ they prepared 
fpices and ointments." 

2. And refiied, indeed, the fabbath-day^ accord- 
ing to the commandment ; hut upon the firft day 
of the week, &c." 

According to the parenthetical ftyle, common in 
this writer, I do not know that he muft: be necef- 
farily underftood to mean, that the fpices and oint- 
ments were prepared before the fabbath. And 
from the fadls, which he and the other Evangelifts 
felate, it is almoft impoffible, that the aromatic 
compofition could have been completed till the 
evening after the fabbath. Chrift did not expire 
till after three o'clock in the afternoon. The crowd 
then difperfed. The Jews applied to Pilate, that 
the legs of the fufFerers might be broken. After 
this, Jofeph of Arimathea begs the body of Jefus. 
Upon the report of the centurion, the requeft is 
granted. It is taken from the crofs. It is em- 
balmed. It is buried ; and a great ftone rolled 
to clofe the fepulchre. All this the women fee, 

and 



5p 



and then return to Jerufalem, by which time it 
could not be far from funfet, (a Httle after lix,) the 
commencement of the fabbath. Bifhop Newcome 
has before thus underftood the paffage. 

Command therefore that the fepulchre he made Jure 
until the third day, leji his difciples come by night, 
and Jieal him away. Matt, xxvii. 64. 

By nighty are words not to be found in the beft 
MSS. and rejedled by Griefbach. 

In the end of the fahhath. Matt, xxviii. i. 
O^i <Ta.tQxruv, pojl fabbatum. Schmidius con- 
fert hue Plutarchum ; o^i tm (3ao-iAsw? x^ovb^v^ et 
Philoftratum tuv T^wdccov. Bengel. Gnomon. 
Thefe examples, which are taken from Confban- 
tins Cephalas, are fatisfadlory to me ; but Mack- 
night and Parkhurft make it vefperi fabbato- 
rum, before funfet on the fahhath-day. This con- 
jedlure, however, feems totally overthrown by the 
preceding verfe, (the lafh of the 27th chapter,) in 
which it is faid that the fepulchre was made fure 
by fealing a ftone and fetting a watch. Now the 
fetting of the watch did not take place till funfet. 
0^1 a-aQQy-rm, therefore, mufi: necelTarily mean after 
the fabbath ; and in that known fcnfe of the word 
oips, there is nothing to rcftrain it to lignify imme- 
diately after. 



60 



As it hegan to dawn. Matt, xxviii. i. 

Inftead of to dawn, Macknight would tranflate it 
to grow twilight, a fenfe which he and Parkhurft 
think that exi(pca(TK£iv will bear^ though very far 
from the primary fenfe. And for this they in- 
fence Luke xxiii. 54. But three MSS. there 
read airscpootTKiv. However that may be^ the diffi- 
culty of reconciling the time of the women's goin^ 
to the fepulchre, at fix in the evening, with the 
time of the angel's anfwering them, (ver. 5.) at 
three the next morning, feems to me greater than 
the difficulty of reconciling the different motives 
affigned for the women's vilit. 

The difficulty of reconciling the language of the 
different Evangelifts as to the time (an old objec- 
tion) was never fo happily obviated as by Chand- 
ler, in his " V/itneiTes of the Refurre6lion re- 
examined," which is a tradl of very great merit on 
this fubjedl, efpecially for the ingenious application 
of claffical learning. Now, it is alked by the ene- 
mies of Chrifhianity, Can the dawn (t*? sTri^coo-Kouo-v?) 
and the rifmg of the fun (ocvxTBiXuvrog nAiov) be the 
fame time ? Yet Chandler obferves, that in the 
ftory of Darius's eledlion by the neighing of his 
horfe, (Herod, lib. iii. c. 85, 86, 87, 88.) the 
Greek hiflorian ules indifferently the phrafes, ^Xio\3 

£Trcivxrek}^ovroi;, dfj^u, rco n'Xtw oiviovri, and C4,«,' Yifj.s^i^ iiot-^ 

(pmMV(7Yi, to denote the fame point of time. Whence 

he 



01 



he infers, that the Greeks by oivoLrexxovros ^?Aiau did 
not, as we do, mean the appearance of the fua 
above the horizon, but the period from his firft 
rays making the dawn to break, till his appearance. 
And this is clear from Juftin's account (lib. i. c. 
lo.) of the fame ftory of Darius. 

Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James ^ 
and Salome, had bought fweet fpices, 

Mark, xvic i. 

Hyopao-av, bought, and not, as in the text, had 
bought. This feems to have been in the evening 
after the fabbath. And more fpices might have 
been neceffary to be added, as many mixtures re- 
quire. Or rather St. Luke may be underftood of 
this time, in c. xxiii. ver. 56. Yet this aorill is 
fometimes ufed to denote the paft time. See 
Chandler on Matthew xxviii. 17. 

And very early in the mornings the firjl day of the 
week, they came unto the fepulchre, lb. 2. 
The phrafe in the tranflation, very early in the 
morning, is exadlly the fame here as in Luke xxiv, 
1, Yet in the Greek there is not one word the 
fame. In Luke it is c^S-pou j3a^fof ; here it is Xjaw 
-rr^m. But the TT^wi was a particular part of the 
morning, from three o'clock to lix, and conftituted 
the laft military watch, in which fenfe it is accu-^ 
xately ufed by Mark, xiii. 35. It was Ajai/ Tr^m^- 

early 



62 



early in the K^m^ probably about a quarter aftef 
four o'clock, reckoning the return of the fun ac- 
cording to Chandler, in the laft remark but one. 

They came unto the fepulchre^ hringing the fpices 
which they had prepared y and certain others with 
them. Luke xxiv. 12. 

The words, and certain others with them, are 
wanting in fome of the beft MSS. and Grielbach 
thinks that they fhould be rejected. 

Then arofe Peter ^ and ran unto the fepulchre. 

Ibid. 12. 

This twelfth verfe is not to be found at all in 
the Cambridge MS. edited by Dr. Kipling, nor in 
two of the MSS. collated by Blanchinius ; and it 
is only in the margin of the Syriac verlion of Jeru- 
falem. Indeed, I am very much inclined to fuf- 
pe(5l it, efpecially as it feems to make St. Luke in- 
confiftent with himfelf ; for a little below (ver. 
24.) he makes the travellers^ in relating this fame 
ftory, ufe the plural number; " Certain of them 
which were with us went to the fepulchre, and 
found it even fo, as the women has faid : but him 
they faw not " If, therefore^ the verfe, notwith- 
ftanding all this, be really from the pen of the 
Evangel ift, at leaft we muft fuppofe, that, although 
he names Peter only, fome one other at all events 
was with him ; and then the circumftance, which 

he 



63 



he relates^ will be parallel with the ftory which St. 
John^ one of the perfons concerned, details more 
fully and accurately in the particulars, and St, 
Luke himfelf gives more fummarily ftill through 
the travellers in the 24th verfe. 

And Jloopng down, he beheld the linen clothes laid 
by them/elves. Luke xxiv. 12. 

The words, laid by them/elves, are omitted in twQ 
ancient and five more modern MSS. 

And departed, wondering in himfelf at that which 
was come to pafs, lb. 

Ilfo? la-jTov is joined, by Griefbach, to the former, 
and not to the latter word. The paffage fhould 
then be tranilated, departed to his own home, 
wondering at that which was come to pafs." The 
fame phrafe is fo tranflated John xx. 10, 

But Mary flood without at the fepulchre weeping, 

John. XX. II, 

Eic-rrxst, the praeterpluperfedi:, inftead of the im- 
perfedl or the aorift ; as in fome other verbs, psSr,- 
xa, sSforxEiv, he. Chandler wifhes to underftand 
this as a real praeterplu perfedl, and to tranfpofe, in 
effect, what follows, to the end of the i8th verfe, 
making it prior in order of time, immediately after 
the firft verfe. But I think this very forced. 



And 



64 



And they departed quickly from the fepulchre with 
fear and great joy ; and did run to bring his dif- 
ciples word. Matt, xxviii. 8. 

More literally thus, having departed quickly 
out of the fepulchre with fear and great joy, they 
did run, &c." 

The difference is important, becaufe St. Mat- 
thew thus incidentally confirms St. Mark, that the 
women entered into the fepulchre. 

And as they went to tell his di/hiples. lb 9. 

The Vv^ords, as they went to tell his difciples^ 
are omitted in the Vatican and Beza's MS. in 
eleven other good MSS, of more modern date, by 
Origen, Chryfoftom, Jerome, and Auguflin, among 
the Fathers, and many of the old verftons. 

Now when Jefus was rifeii early the firjl day of the 
week, he appeared jlrji to Mary Magdalene, out of 
whom he had cajl /even devils, &c. &c. 

Mark xvi. 9 — 20. 

All which follows in St. Mark, from this ninth 
verfe to the end of the Gofpel, is wanting in a very 
ancient MS. preferved in the Vatican. In fome 
others it is marked with an afterilk:. Wetilenius 
and Bengelius fay, that in the Armenian verfion it 
is feparated from the preceding parts of the Gof- 
pel. The copy ufed by Eufebius feems to have 

ended 



65 



ended at the eighth verfe ; and it appears undoubt- 
edly, from a great variety of ancient teftimonies^ 
that formerly almoft all the copies ufed in Greece^ 
and many others of the beft authority, did go no 
further. An ancient MS. which R. Stephens had 
from the royal library of France, fubjoins here. 

And in fome copies is to be found this. But all 
the things given in charge they related briefly to 
thofe who were with Peter. And after thefe 
things, Jefus himfelf lent forth from the Eafi: even 
to the Weft by them the holy and uncorrupted 
preaching of eternal falvation." The fame alfo is 
found in the margin of the Philoxenian verfion. 
The MS. of R. Stephens then proceeds, cc-riv h x«i 
Taura 9£/>o,a£va, and then gives the concluflon of the 
Gofpel, as it ftands in the common copies from 
the end of the eighth verfe. The Latin tranflation 
in a Cambridge MS. flops at the lixth verfe. 

The awkward connexion, repeating what had 
been faid before ; the phrafe, Trpior-^ o-aCgaTou, (appa- 
rently the miftake of a Greek3 wTiting in the perfon 
of a Jew,) inftead of /^ta (raScarwy, every where elfe 
ufed by St. Mark, and all the Evangelifls, in de- 
fcribing the day of the refurre<5lion ; the mention of 
the feven devils having been cafb out of Mary 
Magdalene, fo foon after iTie had been nam_ed, 
without any fuch alluflon; and the great variations 
of the MSS. in the remaining verfes of the com.- 
mon copies ; do, I confefs, make me very much 
F • fufpedl 



60 



fiifpe<5l the paflage: and, aided by the politive au- 
thority of fo many MSS. feem on the whole to be 
decilive againft it. 

And Jlie went and told them that had been with 
him^ as they mourned and wept, Mark xvi. lo. 

Mourned and wept with her/* according to 
the Syriac verfion of Jerufalem : but the common 
reading is certainly better. 

After that he appeared In another form unto two of 
them, lb. 12. 

St. Luke's narrative does not import this. He 
fays, " the eyes of the two difciples were holden." 
This looks like the error of an interpolator in St. 
Mark. 

Afterward he appeared unto the eleven as they fat 
at meat, lb. 14, 

*To-T5pov, lafily^ not afterwards. The proper mean-= 
ing of this word was probably foftencd in the 
tranflation, to make the pafTage harmonize the 
better with the other Evangel ifts, and to allow the 
better of the 19th verfe being applied to a fubfe« 
qucnt time. 

Mr. Chandler connedls this with the appearance 
to Thomas, recorded by John. 

But there is a great difficulty in reconciling 
what is here attributed to St, Mark with the ac- 
counts 



07 



counts of the other Evangehfts. That the Apo- 
ftles were Jitting at meat, is not hinted by St. Johrij 
and is rather inconliftent with the queftion of our 
Saviour, in St. Luke^ Have you here any meat ? 
But, in truth, does not neceffarily mean 

at meat, but at table. It might be after meat, as 
the piece of broiled fifh rather implies. 

And upbraided them with their unbelief and hard- 
nefs of heart, becauje they believed not them. 
which had feen him after he was rifen. 

Mark xvi. 1 4. 

Here follows a verfe in fome Greek copies, ac- 
cording to Jerom. In the Latin it is, " Et illi 
fatisfaciebant dicentes ; feculum iftud iniquitatis et 
incredulitafis fubftantia eft, quae non linit per im- 
mundos fpiritus veram Dei apprehendi virtutemo 
Idcirco jam nunc revela juftitiam tuam." The ftyle 
of this palTage fufficiently fhews it to be fpurious. 

And he /aid unto them, Go ye into all the worlds 
and preach the Gofpel to every creature. 

Ibid. 15. 

Kri^v^ocrs TO £vo^.yy£Xiov tvolu'a tv\ ktjo-b, I do not 

know that Trao-c^ jctjo-k is ufed in this fenfe, of the 
whole creation, for every creature^ except by St« 
Paul ; and in Col, i. 23. is the very phrafe, which 
(if this conclulion of St. Mark's Gofpel be not 
genuine) may be fuppofed to have been copied ? 

P 2 Tay 



68 



follows from the 15th verfe to the end is fup plied 
by a more modern hand in the Cambridge MS. of 
Beza. 

Tkey Jhall take up ferpents. Mark xvi. 18. 

" And in their hands they fhall take, &c/' So 
read the more ancient, and feveral other MSS. as 
well as two or three verQons. 

This miraculous power looks fo like an allulion 
to the adventure of St. Paul at Melita, A(5ls xxviii. 
the only fadl of the kind related in ecclefiaftical 
hillory concerning any of the Apoftles or Difci- 
pies, that it appears to me to furnifh another pre- 
fumption againft the authenticity of the conclulion 
of St. Mark's Gofpel. A fabricator would natu- 
rally be induftrious to weave in every little thread, 
that he could, from the genuine Scriptures. So 
alfo the drinking of poifon unhurt is attributed to 
St. John by Auguftin, Ifidor, Melitus, and others ; 
and to Barfabas, furnamed the Juft, by Eufebius. 
See Fabric. Cod. N. T. Apocryph. torn. i. p. 576. 

And if they drink any deadly thing, it Jhall not hurt 
them, lb. 

In the original, the phrafe xav 3-avao-<^ov rt Trtwo-tv 
(an elegant and elliptical expreffion, never ufed 
elfewhere in the New Teftament, and given only 
in the fuller and plainer form by Jofephus, and 

more 



69 



more commonly too, even by claffical authors^ 
^otvot(TiiJi.ov (poc^fji^oLnov) fecms to me very unlike the 
ufual ftyle of St. Mark. So likewife, xaXw? ^x^iv, 
to lecome well^ to recover, is never ufed elfewhere 
in the New Teftament, many as are the miracu- 
lous cures there related ; and is very good and ele-= 
gant Greek. 

So then, after the Lord had fpoken unto them, he 
was received up into heave7i, and fat on the right 
hand of God, Mark xvi. 19. 

The natural and obvious interpretation of thefe 
words would conne6t the afcenlion with the ap- 
pearance, and fpeech jufb before related, of our 
Saviour to the Apoftles. But this we know was 
very far from the fadl. There were forty days, 
and many other appearances of Chrift, before the 
afcenfion. What is here obferved feems to add 
to the other fufpicions of the conclulion of St. 
Mark's Gofpel in the common copies. If this be 
really fuppofititious, it is probable that the fabri- 
cator was led into an error by mifunderftanding 
Luke xxiv. 50. which by no means is fo connected 
with that which precedes. 

Townfon on the Gofpels obferves, (p. 21.) for 
another purpofe, that in all St. Mark's Gofpel 
Chrift is never called the Lord, except in the 19th 
verfe of this chapter. Surely this is a ftrong addi- 
tional reafon for fufpedling the whole paffage. 

F 3 Irenaeus 



70 



Irenaeus is a main authority for the ccnclulion 
of this Gofpel, as it now ftands, lince he diftindlly 
quotes the 19th verfe, hb. iii. c. 10. 6. But 
it may be oblerved^ that he feems to have quoted 
it as the very concluding words, without thofe 
which follow in the prefent 20th verfe. Every 
diveriity either of omiffion or addition is of conli- 
derable weight in fuch a queftion. 

On the fubjedl of the concluding twelve verfes, 
Michaelis has lately added, that there is, in the 
Wolfenbuttel Library, a Greek MS, which has a 
prologue to St. Mark's Gofpel, that takes no fort 
of notice of this conclulion. The ProfelTor's own 
hypothelis (for as fuch he gives it with diffidence) 
is lingular. He fuppofes, that all the reft was 
written at Rome, with the affiftance of St. Peter, 
but thefe twelve verfes at Alexandria, after the 
Apoftle's death ; an hypothelis, which, (the author 
of it remarks) though it afcribes them to St. Mark, 
yet deprives them of that hiftorical, and, he might 
have faid, infpired, certainty, which they would 
have pOiieffed, if written under the immediate in- 
fpection of St. Peter. At any rate, however, (fub- 
joins he,) they have the appearance of an addition, 
which does not tally with the preceding part of the 
difcourfe. His Englifh commentator owns, (and I 
agree with him,) that the ProfelTor's mode of argu- 
ing on this fubjedl is not always very intelligible. 
Mr. Marlh himfelf, therefore, hints a new hypo- 
thecs 



71 



thdis ftill ; that, as it is incredible the Gofpel ever 
ended with the words eooQowtq ya^, the original 
conclulion may have been loft in an early age, and 
its place fupplied by that which is now extant. 
He informs us, however, that Dr. Storr, in his 
DifTertatio Exegetica in Lib. N. T. Hiftor. ali- 
quot loca, p. 50 — 67. has given a very learned and 
ingenious defence of its authenticity. 

I am forry that I have not feen Dr. Storr's vin- 
dication ; but it muft throw much new light in- 
deed on the controverfy, if it could alter the deli- 
berate opinion which I have formed, after having 
attentively conlidered the fubjedt, at intervals, for 
feveral years, that the 'twelve verfes in queftion are 
fpurious. 

Griefbach puts into the other fcale feveral of the 
ancient Fathers, as acknowledging thefe verfes ; 
Clemens of Rome, and of Alexandria, Juftin Mar- 
tyr, Dionylius, and Hippolytus. Their teftimony 
would be of great weight ; but I cannot find any 
thing of it. Neither has Lardner, in his extradls 
from them, nor Jones, among his lift of references, 
any trace of thefe authorities. Mill likewife makes 
no fuch references. Jones, indeed, exprefsly defends 
this chapter. Yet he only cites Irenseus, Athanaftus, 
and Auftin. His next two politions are clearly 
erroneous, that all the Greek MSS. now extant, 
without exception, and all the ancient verftons, 
have thefe verfes. And to thefe arguments he 
p 4 adds^ 



72 



adds, finally, a remark of Grotius, that it is very 
improbable St. Mark would omit the refnrre6lion, 
one of the moft coniiderable parts of the Go! pel 
hiftory." But, in fa6t, St. Mark has not omitted 
it ; only he has not thought proper to accum.ulate 
all the proofs. This is not unhke the diltinguifh- 
ing character of his whole narrative ; and it feems 
no more mcredible (notwithftanding the fuppofi- 
tion of Mr. Marfh) that he fhould have ended it 
with s:pcho'jvTo y(Kp^ for they were afraid \ xhuTk tliat 
he fhould have begun it fo abruptly as he has. If 
he had himfelf continued the hiftory of Chn/fs 
appeara?ices, he could not well have avoided men- 
tioning (without the aukwardnefs apparent in the 
prefent conclulion) three diilindl events, honour- 
able to St. Peter; his warmth of zeal, above even 
the beloved difciple, in going into the fepulchre ; 
the feparate appearance of Chrifl to him that very 
day ; and the x\poftle's faith in leaping into the 
fea, at Chriffs firft appearance in Galilee, related 
by John. He could not have explained the im^- 
mediate confequence of the women not telling any 
thing of the firfl: vifion and melTage of the angel, 
which circumfbance, as we learn from John, occa- 
lioned the vilit of Peter and himfelf to fee whether 
the body was gone, as Mary Magdalene had re- 
prefented, but he muft necefiarily have introduced 
Peter, and that too in a manner fomewhat deroga- 
tory to John. It appears to me, therefore, very 

congenial 



73 



congenial with the modefty of St. Peter^ confpicu» 
ous in fo many other places, to have flopped his 
difciple and fellow-labourer here. 

And 'when Jhe had thus fa 'id^Jhe turned herf elf hack^ 
ajid Jaw Jefus Jlanding, and knew not that It was 
Jefus, John xx. 14. 

Mary Magdalene is here faid to have turned her- 
felf hack\ and afterwards, in ver. 16. again to have 
turned herfelf. Schacht, in his Harmony of the 
RefurredHon, propofes, as a folution of the diffi- 
culty, the fuppolition, that in the firfl: inftance fhe 
only turned her head, and in the fecond her w^hole 
body. Or, he adds, after her addrefs to Jefus as 
the gardener, fhe may again naturally enough 
have diredled her attention to the fepulchre. This 
is from Koecher. I prefer the former folution, 

Jefus faith unto her^ Touch nie not. lb. 17. 

My\ [xov octttov. Mr. Chandler would tranflate 
this, Embrace me not, hold me not. And he pro- 
duces many examples from Homer, Xenophonj 
and Euripides, Hec. ver. 339. aj^at ^y\'c^o<;, embrace 
thy mother, Ava£fSr,xa he would tranflate as a pre- 
fent tenfe, as it muft mean, he fays, John iii. 13 « 
when Chrifc had certainly not afcended. He 
quotes Homer alfo in the firft Ihad, ver. 37. for 
the fimilar ufe of another compound from the 
fame primitive verb, 1$ X^ua-w^ £&iA(piQB^moc? t he 

would 



74 



would then join this, not with the preceding, but 
the following fentence ; and the whole fenfe will be. 

Hold me not ; for I am not yet going to afcend 
to my Father : but go unto my brethren, and fay 
unto them, I do afcend (for I lhall Ihortly afcend) 
unto my Father and your Father, unto my God 
and your God." 

He brings many inftances of the prefent tenfe 
(as avoL^xivuj here) being ufed to lignify what is 
fhortly to be done. 

Vogelius has here a very ingenious conjedlure of 

ou TTToou, be not afraid, for /xr; ^aou aTrrov, touch me 
not. This approaches fo near to the traces of the 
letters, and, belides, fo refembles the firft addrefs of 
Chriffc to the women in Matthew, and of the 
angel to the women in Matthew and Mark, Fear ye 
not, he not affrighted ; that, if it were fupported by 
any manufcript authority, I fhould willingly adopt 
it. But the facred text Ihould not be altered on 
conjecture only. 

Bowyer in his Conjedlures propofes, /otr. ,aou aVrou* 
iVb; (I am not the gardener, as you fuppofe ;) touch 
me. And for this he quotes Paulus Bauldrius in 
Neoceri Bibliotheca. But it feems to me too re- 
fearched a reading, and inconliftent with Mary*s 
previous recognition of Chrift in the appellation of 
Rabboni. 

Koecher obferves, that Michaelis propofes to 
make it an interrogation. Do you not touch me f as 

inviting 



75 



inviting that teft of his real appearance. Kypke in 
his Obfen^ (he fays) explains the palTage as a pro- 
hibition of adoration until after his afcenlion. 

On the whole^ I continue to adhere to Chand- 
ler's explanation^ to which I would add^ that oi^(pk- 
Qi^Yixag is explained by the Pfeudo Didymus, as 
moiQsQrr/.ocg vTrioy^oi^x^ic, clearly giving it a prefent 
fignification, and fhewing that the other com- 
pounds of the fame verb are ufed in the fam.e man- 
ner. Thus too the praeterpluperfe6l tenfe of the 
limple verb is ufed by Homer to denote merely 
pafl: time, as equivalent to the aorift of other verbs, 

o'jXvfM'Teov^i Cfbvixn, II. a . 22 1 . which the fame fcho- 
liaft interprets by <x7ri7.nXvBii, gTto^iv^n, Ariftopha- 
nes has ^cQmu; Trfpt G-xu^avot?, which the fcholiaft ex- 
plains by U7r£p^(3<p(^a;v c>iViJ.vGi^, 

St. John has a limilar form of another com- 
pound of (Gaivw, ufed for the prefent tenfe, chap. v. 

ver. 24- ocXXa. ^ira.%i%y\y.iv £>c tou S'avaiTOu £ij i^oonv* 

Some of the Latin MSS. in this place tranflate 
lj.iTccQ£Qmiv by tranfit \ and fome Greek MSS. of 
inferior note and modern date, feeUng a fuppofed 
incongruity, read /AcTaS>j(r£T5i», as thinking the future 
more confiftent with the refh of the context. 

Homer has (izQrxs, or ^s^maiy in the fenfe of a 
limple, prefent, or paft, and that in a connexion, 
which fo marks it, fix or feven times, and never 
otherw^ife. 



76 



But they coiiflrained him, fay^^gy Abide with us 
for it is towards evenings and the day is far 
/pent. Luke xxiv. 29. 

From the phrafe, it was towards evening, Bi- 
iliop Newcome and others, who reckon the hours 
of St. John contrary to Mr. Townfon's mode of 
computation, fay, that it was now near three 
o'clock. But could the day be fairly faid to 
have been far fpent/' fo as to be an argument to 
induce a traveller not to go further, before three 
o'clock in the latter end of March, or beginning of 
April ? Befides, three o'clock was not the Jevvifh 
time of fupping, but fix o'clock. The paflagc 
therefore feems properly to apply to the natural 
evening, and to afford very fairly the inference 
which Mr. Townfon draws from it. 

And their eyes were opened, and they knew him ; 
and he vanijhed out of their fight. lb. 31. 

Mr. Chandler refers to Anacreon, Ode xxiii. 
ver. 4; to Pindar, Olymp. a. ver. 72; and to Hefy- 
chius, in proof that this paiTage of St. Luke does 
not necefTarily imply the vanifhing of Chrift, as 
an unfubftantial thing, or apparition, but only that 
he fuddenly c ifappeared. 

Herodotus alfo, lib. vii. c. 37. fpeaking of the 
Sun being ohfcured^ fays, 0L(pQLvm BysviTo, 



Then 



77 



Then the fame day at eveyiing^ i^^^g firjl day of 
the week, John xx. 19. 

This is another paflage which Mr. Townfon 
produces to prove that St. John did not reckon his 
day hke the other Evangehfts. This appearance 
of Chrift clearly took place after the return from 
Emmaus. It was towards evening when they ar- 
rived there ; fupper time came ; their repaft was 
prepared and ferved ; and then they had feven miles 
and a half to meafure back to Jerufalem ; which, 
muft have brought them to the next day^ accord* 
ing to the Jewifh reckoning. 

Ayid they gave him a piece of a broiled fifh^ and. -an 
honeycomb. Luke xxiv. 42. 

Four of the bcft and moft ancient MSS. 1;he 
Alexandrine in the Britifh Mufeum, the Vatican^ 
Beza's at Cambridge, and one in the royal libf; ary 
of France, a Greek and Latin MS. at Cambridge^ 
and Clemens Alexandrinus, one of the early fa- 
thers, totally omit the honeycomb. The Syriac ^ er- 
fiion of Philoxenus marks it with an afterilk. 

And he faid unto them, lb. 44. 

But he faid, i^iti &c. Griefbach here begi ns a 
new paragraph, and I think rightly. This dif- 
courfe may have been at a different time from the 
preceding appearance, and from verfe 49, whi< :h is 

I; ranf- 



78 



tranfpofed, and feems to have taken place after the 
return of the Apoftles from Gahlee, or was ad- 
drefled to them there. 

After thefe things J ejus Jltewed hhnfelf again to the 
difcipJes at the fea of Tiberias, John xxi. i. 

The fcene is here changed to Gahlee; and, be- 
fides the appearance here recorded at the fea of 
Tiberias, St Matthew has recorded another on a 
rriountain of Gahlee. But in the concluding verfes 
of St* Mark, which lliortly recite feveral of Chrift's 
appearances after the refurredlion, none is men- 
tioned as taking place in Galilee, though in the 
fpeech of the angel to the women there is an ex- 
prefs promife to that efFedl in St. Mark, as well as 
Ste Matthew. Michaelis notices this ; and it is 
ceitainly another additional ground of fufpe6ling 
the concluiion of St. Mark's Gofpel. 

Simon Peter went up, and drew the net to land full 
%f great fifhes^ an hundred and fifty and three. 

Ibid. 11. 

Mr. Harmer obferves, from Haffelquift, and 
He)^man, and Egmont, that in the fea of Galilee 
are :fifh called karmud and bonni, each of which 
weighs ordinarily about thirty pounds. Thefe fpe- 
cies are alfo found in the Nile, 

It is, perhaps, to this appearance of Chrift that 
Peter alludes, A6ls x. 40, 41. Him God raifed 

up 



79 

up the third day, and fliewed him openly; not to 
all the people, but tinto witnefles chofen before of 
God^ even unto us^ who did eat and drink with 
him after he rofe from the dead." 

Or was it to the circumftance recorded by Luke^ 
xxiv. 41, 42, 43 ? 

It agrees better with this incident/ becaufe here 
only did they eat and drink with him. 

This /pake he, figntfying hy what death he JhouJd 
glorify God, John xxi. 19, 

Does St. Peter allude to this prediction in his 
fecond Epiftle, chap. i. ver. 14 ? *^ Knowing that 
Ihortly I mufi: put off this my tabernacle^ as the 
Lord hath Ihewed me." 

I think he does. In the original it is expreffed 
not limply as^ but in fuch manner as, and not hath 
Jhewed, but more indefinitely Jhewed, jtaS-w? ih'k<a<Ti 
fMot : the word i^xua-s being an aorift expreffive of 
an indefinitely pafl time, and naturally applying to 
fomething pail, not to any thing recent, and hav- 
ing a connexion with the prefent time, which is 
the proper force of what is commonly called the 
prseterperfedl tenfe, here inaccurately fubflituted 
in our tranflation for the aorift. 

Dr. Lardner is of the fame opinion. 



80 



And there are alfo many other things which Jefus 
did, &c. John xxi. 25. 

This laft verfe of St. John's Gofpel is wanting 
in a MS. of fome authority, belonging to Dubhn 
Univerlity; and, as many of the fchohafts teftify, 
was anciently thought by fome to be an addition. 
But it has the fandlion of all the old verlions ; and, 
among the fathers^ of Origen, Cyril, and Chryfo- 
ftom. 

The former treatife have I made, Theophilus, of 
all that Jefus hegan to do and to teach, until the 
day in which he was taken up. A6ls i. 2. 

St. Luke here exprefsly fays, that his Gofpel 
ends with the afcenfion, which contradidts decifively 
thofe MSS, which, by omitting fome words in the 
5ifl: and 5 2d verfes of the 24th chapter of the 
Gofpel, feem to apply differently what is there re- 
lated. 

Here he defcribes the afcenlion again in detail. 

Being feen of them forty days, lb. 3. 

" He was feen many days of them which came 
up with him from Galilee to Jerufalem." Ads 
xiii. 31. 



When 



81 



When they therefore were come together, they ajkecl 
of him ^faying, &c. Adls i. 6. 

It fhould rather be tranflated, They therefore^ 
who were come together^ allied him, &c." Ot |W£v ouv 
o-uvsxS-ovTg? appear to me only words of defcription : 
but our received tranflation feems to imply, that 
the queftion, which follows, was put at a meeting 
fubfequent to that which is defcribed in ver. 4. 

And when he had given him licence, Paul flood on 
the flairs, and Reckoned with th^ hand unto the 
people, A^ts xxi. 40. 

KocTEG-BKn T>5 yji^i* The word, which is tranflated 
beckoned, is ufed by Heliodorus, 1. x. p. m, 464. 
and by Appian, Alexand. de B. C. lib. p. m. 762. 
to fignify the particular motion of the hand, which 
was employed by the ancients to command or de- 
lire filence, and to indicate a wifh of addreffing 
the multitude. This, I believe, was not done by 
heckoning. 

And 1 anfwered, Who art thou. Lord f And he 
faid unto me, I am Jefus of Nazareth, whom thou 
perfecutefl, Adlsxxii. 8. 

At the end of this verfe, one fentence, which 
occurs in other places where this ftory is told, has 
been added in fome MSS. as alfo at the end of the 
feventh verfe. In the former place it is fupplied 



82 



from xxvi. 4. and in this place from ix. 5. But 
there feems to me to be great beauty in the omif- 
lion here. The phrafe^ importing the impoffibi- 
lity of prevaiUng againft the Chriftian religion by 
perfecution^ might have offended the audience ; 
and from the fame prudence, probably, the Apoftle 
here paffes over the commiffion, which he now re- 
ceived, to preach both to the Jews and the Gen- 
tiles, and which he afterwards (xxvi. 16, 17, 18.) 
communicated to King Agrippa. He had been 
charged by the Jews (xxi. 28.) wkh teaching 
againft the people^ and the temple, and bringing 
Gentiles into the temple, and fo polluting it ; in re- 
gard to which charge, he purpofed to relate his fe- 
cond vilion of Chrift, and his fecond commiffion 
from his divine Mafter, given to him in the temple, 
by which he was ordered to depart frojn thence^ as 
rejedled by the Jews, and, on account of their ohjli- 
nacy, to apply himfelf wholly to the Gentiles. 
Standing upon the fteps of the caftle, and fur- 
rounded by Roman foldiers, he knew that he was 
fafe from the fury of the multitude. He was de- 
firous, therefore, of taking that opportunity to af- 
fert the heavenly authority by which he adled, in 
teaching againji the people and the temple, in confe- 
quence of their own hardnefs of heart ; and, that 
he might not be interrupted before he came with 
due preparation to that part of his addrefs, he de- 
lignedly pafles over in lilence every thing which 

might 



83 



might have irritated his hearers. I think that, in 
this fair and honefi: management of his fubjedl, I 
fee the hand of a great mafter in pubUc fpeaking ; 
as I do alfo in the contrary courfe, which he after- 
wards purfued (xxvi.) when he made his defence^ 
under different circumftances, before Feftus and 
Agrippa. It had been revealed to him that the 
Jewifh people would not receive his teftimonyi 
but he might hope to perfuade Feftus and Agrippa 
to proted not him, (for he had appealed to Rome, 
and knew from revelation that he mull go thi- 
ther,) but his Chriftian brethren, whom he left be- 
hind. 

Then Paul^ after that the governor had beckoned to 
him to /peak, anfwered, &c. A6ts xxiv. i Q. 

The word here tranflated beckoned is vsuc-avroc^ 
a word totally different from that which is tranf- 
lated by the fame term^ c. xxi. ver. 40. It Ihould 
have been nodded. 

And as he reafoned of right eoufnefs, temperance, and 
judgment to come^ Felix trembled, lb. 25, 

Dr. Wells has happily illuftrated St. Paul's ad- 
drefs on this occafion by a paflage of Tacitus, re- 
lative to the charadler of Felix; who, fays the hif- 
torian, per omnem f^evitiam, et libidinem, jus re- 
gium fervili ingenio exercuit." He would, there - 
fore, inftead of right eouftiefs and temperance, fay^ 



84 



jujiice and continence. But temperance is right* 
That virtue, among the ancients, meant a felf con- 
troul over all the appetites, and not over the pa- 
late alone. 

Then Paul Jiretched forth the hand, and anfwered 
for himfelf, A6ls xxvi. i. 

Then Paul, ftretching forth his hand, made his 
defence. 

/ think myfeif happy. King jigrippa, lecaufe 1 Jhatl 
anfwer for myfeif this day before theey touching all 
the things whereof I am accufedhy the Jews, lb. 2. 

The order of the original is much more elegant 
and happy. " Concerning all whereof I am ac- 
cufed by the Jews, King Agrippa, I think myfeif 
happy that I am to defend myfeif before thee this 
day." What follows is thus much better con- 
nected, and the whole compolition is in confe- 
quence more compadl and beautiful. The whole 
fpeech is one of the fineft and mold polifhed, as 
well as moft dexterous, orations, which have come 
down to us from antiquity. This alone almoft 
fetisfies me of the truth of the fragment attributed 
to Longinus, whofe tafte, if he ever read (and it is. 
probable that he might have read) the different 
fpeeches of Paul, from the beginning of the 2 2d 
chapter to the end of the Adls, could not have 

failed 



85 



failed to rank him amongft the moft eminent of 
the Greek orators. 

Which knew me from the heginning, A6I9 xxvi. 5. 

" Being acquainted with me from an early pe- 
riod." 

But rife^ and Jiand upon thy feet : for I have ap- 
peared unto thee for this purjpofe, to make thee a 
mtnijier and a witnefsy both of thefe things which 
thou hajl feen, and of thofe things in the which I 
will appear unto thee, lb, 16. 

This part of the commiffion given to Paul is 
not related in St. Luke's own narrative of the 
tranfadlion^ (c. ix.) nor in Paul's own addrefs to 
the Jews ; (xxii. 6 — 17.) Yet there is no incon- 
liftency in this. St. Luke accommodated his fhort 
hiftory to his own plan ; and, as he knew what is 
here introduced, if it were only from this very 
fpeech, which he has recorded, his omiffion of it 
muft have been voluntary. The omiffion of it by 
St. Paul himfelf in addreffing the Jews, to whom 
he was under no obligation to tell more than was 
neceflary, may have been, and probably was, con^ 
fummate fkill. 



Where- 



80 



IVhereupon, King Agrippa, I was not difohedient 
unto the heavenly vijion. A6ls xxvi. 19. 

Paul here, with the greateft dexterity, avoids all 
mention of the fecond vilion, which fent liim ex- 
prefsly to the Gentiles, as rejedled by the Jews, 
and proceeds to relate only his labours in general 
under his original commiffion, which included 
both the people, and the nations ; the Jews, and 
the Gentiles. It was the fecond commiffion, or- 
dering Paul to depart from the temple, and preach 
to the heathen, which fo inflamed the Jews againft 
him. (xxii. 12.) The occafion, and the charge 
brought againft him, might then fairly feem to 
demand the mention of it ; now he wifhed not to 
exafperate Agrippa. 

That Chriji Jhould fuffer, and that he Jhould he the 
jirji that JJiould rife from the dead, and fhould 
fhew light unto the people, and to the Gentdes. 

Ibid. 23. 

The word that, twice occurring, fhould be if, 
ii — £{. The literal tranflation is, If Chrift is 
fubjedl to fufFering, if firft from the refurredl:ion 
of the dead, he is to be the meffenger of light to 
the people, and the nations." The fenfe is nearly 
the fame, but the turn of the language more re- 
fearched and rhetorical; and, let me add, more de- 
licate 



87 



licate towards Agrippa^ who might be fuppofed to 
doubt: thefe dodlrines. 

I cannot conclude thefe few remarks on this ad- 
mirable fpeech, without recurring to one pointy 
which I incidentally mentioned in m.y note on 
ver. 2. I mean, the probability that the praife of 
Paul^ attributed to Longinus, is genuine. Ammo- 
nius Saccus, the mafter of Longinus, though not 
the Ammonius who compofed an harmony of tlie 
Gofpels, as Eufebius fuppofed, yet was bred a 
Chriftian, as we learn from Porphyry, in his life of 
Plotinus ; and if he afterwards lived according to 
the Jaws^ as the fame author fays, he muft ftill 
have admired St. Paul, if we judge of his talle 
from his charadler. 

j4nd Paul /aid, I would to God, that not only thou, 
hut alfo all that hear me this day, were loth al- 
viojl, and altogether fuch as I am, except thefe 
hands, Adls xxvi. 29. 

I prefer an order more clofely tracing the origi- 
nal ; that both almoft, and altogether, not only 
thou, but likewife all who hear me this day, might 
become fuch as I alfo am, except thefe bonds." 
The Apoftle takes up the turn of the phrafe, and 
the compliment from the word almojl, in the be- 
ginning of Agrippa's fhort fpeech to him ; and 
himfelf, therefore, begins with an elegant allulion 
to that word. 

G 4 Bllt 



88 



But not long after there arofe agatnjl It a tempejiu-^ 
ous wind) called Euroclydon. A6^s xxvii. 14. 

Some copies have Euraquilon. 

And when the Jhip was caught ^ and could not hear 
up Into the wind^ we let her drive. lb. 15, 

Mn ivva.ij(.£vov ocvTofp^xx^siv uvb^m* almoft lite- 
rally, " not being able to keep in the wind's eye 
which is a feaman's phrafe at this day in our own 
language. 

And while the day was coming on, lb. 33, 
Until it began to grow day." 

Taul he/ought them all to take meat, lb, 
" Food." 

^his day is the fourteenth day that ye have tarried^ 
and continued fafting) having taken nothing. lb. 

I prefer the other tranflation fuggefted by Ham- 
mond, Wells, and others. Expedling this day, 
the fourteenth day, you continue falling, having 
taken nothing." That is, according to Dr. Ham- 
mond, folicitoufly attending the fate of the four- 
teenth day as the critical day. 

Dr. Wells obferves alfo, in fupport of the com- 
mon tranflation, Q\jh r* o-irov ncr^tov is explained by 

Tzetzes 



89 



Tzetzes to mean only, that they had made no re- 
gular meals.' 



Now in this that I declare unto you I praifeyou not, 

I Cor. xi. 17. 

Gujc iKOLivu), I praife you not, is an elegant {xitua-is, 
as it is called, ufed by -^lian, a v>^riter almoft too 
attic, and means, / Jlrongly difapprove. See 7EI. 
Var. Hift. lib. ix. c. 4. and lib. xiii. c. 48. This 
is from Palairet. 

Virgil ufes illaudatus in the fame manner : 

— -lUaudati nefcit BiiQridis aras ? 

Though I /peak with the tongues of men and of 
angelsy and have not charity, I am become as 
founding hrafs, or a tinkling cymbal. lb. xiii, i. 

The very elegant allulions of the Apoftle^ in the 
latter part of this verfe, are wholly loft to the 
Englifh reader, and cannot be perfedlly preferved 
in any tranflation without a comment. The found- 
ing brafs, agreeably to a remark of May, in his 
Obfer. Sac. clearly is the fame with the founding 
brazen cauldron, or inftrument in the form of a 
cauldron, which was hung up at Dodona to fur- 
nifh oracular refponfes to the prieft, and which 
had become proverbial, to lignify an inceffant and 

empty 



90 



empty talker. The cymbal, it is well known, was 
one of the principal inftruments employed by the 
priefts of Cybele, in their ceremonies, which were 
peculiarly of a frantic and fenfelefs kind. The 
word aAaAa^ov, which is here tranflated tinkling^ 
properly means, to make a wild cry, to utter tones 
without any regular melody ; and with fuch cries 
the prieffcs of Cybele were accuftomed to accom- 
pany the clang of their cymbals, and other favage 
inftruments. Palairet (to whom I owe this note) 
thinks, that the Apoftle, by an elegant figure of 
fpeech, transfers theje cries to the cymbals ; but, in 
my opinion, the epithet will fairly fuit the noife of 
the cymbal itfelf. 

Now I will come to you, when I Jhall pafs through 
Macedonia, i Cor. xvi. 5. 

St. Luke tells us, (Adls xix. 21, 22.) agreeably 
to what is here intimated, that St. Paul purpofed 
in the fpirit to go to Macedonia and Achaia, and 
thence to Jerufalem and Rome, 

Now if Timothy come, lb. 10. 

Paul, while at Ephefus, meaning to Jlay there 
for a feafon, as St. Luke informs us, had fent Ti- 
mothy and Eraftus into Macedonia, whither he in- 
tended to follow them, after he fhould judge it ex- 
pedient to leave Ephefus. In going to or coming 
from Macedonia, it was probable that Timothy 

might 



91 



might pafs through Corinth. After writing this 
epiftle, it feems that Paul's departure from Ephe- 
fus was haftened by the riot, excited by Deme- 
trius, (Adls xix. 23, &c.) and to this event he ap- 
pears to allude in 2 Cor. i. 8. Timothy had been 
adlually diredled by St. Paul to vifit Corinth^ and 
probably other churches of Achaia by the way, as 
the Apoftle was not immediately to fet forward for 
Macedonia, and it is moft likely that Timothy was 
to wait there till his arrival. This epiftle, I fup- 
pofe, was written foon after Timothy went, and 
before St. Paul had received any certain account of 
his progrefs. 

Knowing that Jliortly I miijl put off this my taher^ 
nacle, even as our Lord Jefus Chriji hath Jhewed 
me. 2 Peter i. 14. 

This fhould rather be tranflated, even in fuch 
manner as our Lord Jefus Chrift JJjeived me." 
KaS-ws — ih'koidi. The verb is in the aorift, not in 
the preterperfe6t tenfe. The difference is, that our 
received tranflation feems to refer to fome recent 
revelation, while the original phrafe rather points 
to a remote prediction of an indefinitely paft time. 
Accordingly (taking to my aid the true meaning 
and force of xa^w?, in fuch manner as) I underitand 
the pafTage as naturally alluding to the predidlion 
recorded by the Evangelifl, John xxi. 18, 19. and 
fignifying " by what death Peter fhould glorify 

God 



92 



God in his old age." This feems to me the more 
probable, becaufe what pafled at this appearance of 
Chrift, near the fea of Tiberias, made a principal 
impreffion on Peter's mind ; as in his difcourfe to 
Cornelius (A6ts x. 40, 41.) he refers to it, in my 
opinion, rather than to the marks of the nails, and 
the fpear in the feet and the lide of Chrift, to fhew 
xhQ reality of the refurredlion. 

This verfe, as an allufion to John xxi. 18, 19. 
was fo underftood by Dr. Lardner, in his Hiftory 
of the Apoftles, &c. but I do not know that any 
one has remarked the peculiar force of the ori- 
ginal, agreeably to the preceding obfervation, which 
I had written before I read Dr. Lardner's explica- 
tion. 



THE 



THE REVELATION. 



The revelation of J ejus Chrift, &c. Rev. i, i. 

. Whitaker, in his Commentary on this book^ 
adopts the following plan. The method," he 
fays^ which I fhall purfae is this : to give, at 
the commencement of every dillindl portion of 
the vilion, an account of the contents of that part, 
divefted of all figurative language ; then to fub- 
join the text ; throwing into notes the reafons on 
which I have interpreted the feveral fymbols ; and 
doling the whole fedlion with hiftorical teftimony 
of the completion of that part of the prophecy.'* 

This method appears, at the firft view, to be 
extremely fair : but, on a clofer examination, it 
may, perhaps, be liable to fome objedlion. The 
introductory account of the fubjedl, fuppofed to 
be contained in every diftindl portion of the vifion, 
cannot fail to influence and prejudice the mind of 
the reader in coniidering the interpretation. It 
would have been fairer, had a recapitulation of the 
contents, divefted of all figurative language," 
been given in the clofe of each fedlion^ as the re- 

fuk 



94 



fult of the evidence adduced. The introduc^lory 
part fhould have been little more than a limple 
connexion. 

The /even ftars are the angels of thefeveti churches ; 
and the /even candleji 'icks which thou fawejl are 
the /even churches. Rev. i. 20. 

The accomplifhment of the Revelation, in the 
prefent condition of the feven churches of Afia, is 
well pointed out by Dr. Newton, from the con- 
curring authorities of the beft modern travellers. 
It is alfo ilrikingly elucidated by the following 
teftimony of Mr. Gibbon. 

" The captivity or ruin of the feven churches 
of Alia was confummated. In the lofs of Ephefm 
the Chriftians deplored the fall of the firft angel ; 
the extinction of the firft candleftick of the Reve- 
lations: the circus, and the three ftately theatres of 
Laodiceay are now peopled with wolves and foxes ; 
Sardis is reduced to a miferable village ; the God 
of Mahomet is invoked in the mofques of Thyatlra 
and Fergamos ; and the populoufnefs of Smyrna is 
fupported by the foreign trade of the Franks and 
Armenians. Philadelphia alone has been faved 
by prophecy or courage ; at a diftance from the 
fea, forgotten by the emperors, encompalTed on all 
lides by the Turks, her valiant citizens defended 
their religion, and their freedom, above fourfcore 
years ; and at length capitulated with the proudeft 

of 



95 



of the Ottomans. Among the Greek colonies and 
churches of Alia, PUladel^hla is ftill erecl ; a cq~ 
lumn, in a fcene of ruins." 

ThuS;, the great adverfary of the Chriftian reU- 
gion, fully affured of the prophecy^ and willing, as 
he has Ihewn himfelf^ to doubt the connexion of 
the accomplifhment with the predidlion itfelf, has 
yet been compelled, by the force of irreliftible 
truth, to bear teftimony to the fa 61. In the moft 
remarkable event which is foretold (the peculiar 
prefervation of the church of Philadelphia) he has 
not been able to find, in all the ftorehoufe of his 
imagination, a limilitude to convey, in a more 
lively manner^ his notion of the prefent ftate of 
that churchy than by adopting the very language 
of St. John. 

Remember therefore from wJietice thou art fallen. 

Rev. ii. 5. 

Bifhop Newton remarks, that all the inhabitants 
of this once famous city [Ephefus) amount not now 
to above forty or fifty families of Turks, without 
one Chrijlum family among them ; fo flrikingly 
has the denunciation been fulfilled, that their can- 
al eft ick fhould be removed out of its place. 



And 



96 



And to the angel of the church in Pergamos write i 
Thefe things faith he which hath the fharp 
fword with two edges : I know thy works, and 
where thou dwellefly even where Satan s feat is. 

Rev. ii. 12, 13. 

Mr. Whitaker's comment upon this paffage 
contains the following obfervation : *^ The next 
epiftle is diredted to be fcnt to the angel of the 
church of Pergamos, the lituation of whofe port is 
perhaps defcribed as Satan s feat, in reference to 
the great temple of ^fculapius in that city, a 
feigned deity, who was fuppofed to have appeared, 
and had been worfhipped, under the form of a fer- 
pent." 

There was a ftatue of ^fculapius on a throne^ 
holding a flafF, and his other hand refting on the 
head of a dragon, as we are informed by Paufanias, 
quoted in Wetftein. 

Repent ; ar elfe I will come unto thee quickly, and 
will fight againfi them with the fword of my 
mouth. lb. 16. 

Pergamos is defcribed as a very ftrong place^ 
and the inhabitants as a very warlike people^ 



97 



To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the 
hidden manna ^ and will give him a white Jlone, 

Rev. ii. 17. 

This is fuppofed, by fome interpreters^ to allude 
to a circumftance, related of Pergamos, that the 
bread of that city was notorioufly bad. See Wet- 
ftein and Dr. H. More. So likewife, for the cuf- 
tom of the white ftone, confult Newcome, Wol- 
fiuS; &c. 

If therefore thou Jhalt not watch, I will come on 
thee as a thief, and thou Jhalt not know what 
hour I will come upon thee, lb. iii. 3. 

Thefe peculiar admonitions may be underftood 
to allude to a circumftance in the hiftory of Sar- 
dis, that, although ftrongly fortified, the city was 
twice taken, in confequence of the negledl here in- 
timated, that of leaving the walls without a watch. 
See Wetftein's note. It was the firft time fo taken 
by Cyrus, (Herod, lib. i. 84*) and afterwards by 
the Athenians (v. 100.) 

So then hecaufe thou art lukewarm, and neither cold 
nor hot, I will fpue thee out of my mouth. 

Ibid. 16. 

Wetftein obferves, that near Laodicea, at Hiera- 
polis^ were fome warm mineral waters ; and he 

M feema 



98 



fecms to fuggeft, that the metaphor here ufed may 
contain an ailulion to that fa6t. 

And when he had opened the fifth feal, I Jaw under 
the altar the fouls of them that were fiain for the 
word of God, and for the tefiimony which they 
held. Rev. vi. 9. 

The interval/' Mr. Whitaker remarks, be- 
tween paft perfecutions, and future juft impending, 
lignified by the emblems of the fifth feal, was ma- 
nifeft in that period which fucceeded the dreadful 
diftradlions from the death of Valerian to the 
laft and moft fevere of all the perfecutions under 
the reign of Diocletian, and his alTociates in the 
empire." 

I do not conceive the fifth feal to mean the in- 
terval here alluded to, from the death of Valerian, 
about 250, to the tenth and laft perfecution in 302. 
It is ftrange that Mr. Whitaker fhould fall into fuch 
confufion, when, in explaining the emblems of the 
fourth feal, he a<ftually produces, in proof of the 
accomplifhment, a paffage from a mandate of the 
emperor Gallienus, fon of Valerian. Comment, 
p. 56. I rather think this feal commences from 
the aera of martyrs, or the reign of Diocletian, and 
well expreffes the fort of interval, from 284, the 
firft year of that aera, to the laft general perfecu- 
tion in 302, and the fury then fhewn againft the 
Chriftian religion by Diocletian, and thofe who 

derived 



09 



derived their power from him^ Maximian, Gale- 
rius, Severus, Maximin^ and Licinius* 

Nor can any thing more ftrikingly Ihew the 
propriety of the imagery, which marks the open- 
ing of the fifth feal, than the common appellation 
given to this period by the eccleliaftical hiftorians. 
It is ufually called the c^ra of martyrs ; and begins 
fome few weeks before the election of Diocletian. 
Bifhop Newton tranliently obferves this hiftorical 
name for the period in queftion ; but it is capable 
of being more forcibly applied. 

The number of perfecutions is generally confi- 
dered as ten. Many writers, however, make but 
nine in all; what Mr. Whitaker calls the ninth 
(p. 65.) being regarded as one with that which he 
terms the laji. The ancient Chriftians feem to 
have Gonlidered the tenth as future. 

And I beheld when he had opened the fixth feal. 

Rev. vi. 12. 

The fifth feal appears to terminate, and of courfe 
the fixth to begin, before the final completion of 
the perfecutions, predi<5led under the former. It 
comprehends two diflin6l parts ; firft, the over- 
throw of the enemies of the Chriftian religion, and 
the downfall of Paganifm itfelf ; and, fecondly, the 
fpace of time, during which the four winds, or 
warhkc commotions, are reftrained, and the faithful 
fealed, after which they are no more to be expofed 
H 2 to 



100 



to tribulation. The whole period of this feal 
feems to me to comprehend the entire dynafty 
founded by Conftantius Chlorus, and to reach 
down to the death of Julian the Apoftate. The 
fealing of the faithful may properly lignify only 
the completion and perfedlion of their faith by 
other trials, and perhaps primarily, as Mr. Whita- 
ker fuggefts, (Comment, p. 72.) the trial by he- 
refy. Hitherto the Chriftian religion had been 
aflailed by diredl force ; the emperors, who had 
perfecuted it down to the time of Confhantine, 
having endeavoured to compel the Chriftians to 
facrifice to idols, under pain of torture and the 
mofl: cruel death. Such a teft admitted of no 
compromife with the name and profeflion of a 
Chriftian. But Conftantius required only an af- 
fent to dodlrines incompatible, in reahty, with 
clear paffages of Scripture, yet maintained as true 
by many bifhops of the church ; and when Julian^ 
on his acceffion, endeavoured to reftore Paganifm, 
he a6led like modern infidels, drefTed up a fpecious 
fhadow in the pure morals, which he borrowed 
from Chriftianity, acknowledged the God of the 
Jews to be a great God, compelled no man to par- 
ticipate in the worfhip which he himfelf preferred, 
but aimed to eftablifh the afcendancy of Paganifm, 
by the favour which he (hewed to its minifters. 
St. Jerome, in his Chronicle, happily defcribes the 
policy of this moft fubtle enemy of Chriftianity, 

when 



101 



when he mentions his elevation and apoftafy. 
" Blanda fuit perfecutio," fays he, ^' iUiciens magis 
quam impellens ad facrificandum ; in qua multi ex 
noftris voluntate propria corruerunt." The father 
is a very good witnefs, as he was then of man's 
eftate. Thus the truly faithful completed their 
trials, and were fealed. 

Since making the foregoing remark, I have 
found, that the courtiers of Conftantine the Great 
particularly afFecled to diftinguiih his hereditary 
right, as the reprefentative of the Emperor Clau- 
dius IL from the title of all thofe who derived 
their power from Diocletian. So Eumenius, who 
had borne an office under Confl-antius Chlorus, in 
his Panegyrick, A. D. 310. " Inter omnes in- 
quam participes majeftatis tuae, hoc habes, Con- 
ftantine, praecipuum, quod imperator (natus) es, 
tantaque eft nobilitas originis tuae^ ut nihil tibi ad- 
diderit honoris imperium." And Treb. Pollio, in 
his Life of Claudius, fays, " Quae idcirco pofui, ut 
fit omnibus clarum, Conftantium divini generis vi- 
rum, fandtiffimum C^farem, et Auguftae ipfum fa- 
mihae efle, et Auguftos multos de fe daturum, JaU 
vis Diocletiano et Maximiniano Auguftis, et ejus 
fratre Galerio." 



And 



102 



And, lo, there was a great earthquake ; and the fun 
became black as fackcloth of ha'ir^ and the moon 
became as blood. Rev. vi. 12. 

On the opening of the lixth feal it is ftated, that 
there was a great earthquake. And we learn from 
the Chronicle of Jerome, that, in the latter end of 
303, when Diocletian was feized with the illnefs, 
which fome years after terminated in his death, 
there was a very terrible earthquake, which over- 
turned Tyre and Sidon, and killed a great number 
of people. John Malala alfo fays, that Salamis in 
Cyprus was deftroyed by an earthquake in the 
time of Conftantius Chlorus : but this may be a 
confulion of names, as Theophanes notices a limi- 
lar event in 343, during the reign of Conftantius, 
the fon of Conftantine. He mentions alfo, inci- 
dentally, that Diocletian rebuih the mint of An- 
tioch, which had been deftroyed by an earth- 
quake. 

With refpedl to the darknefs, Du Frefnoy ob- 
ferves, that fome authors tell us, there was a fud- 
den obfcurity at noon day, in the year 291, when 
Conftantius Chlorus was firft made Caefar. There 
is reafon further to believe, that fomething of the 
fame kind occurred after the earthquake in 303 ; 
which was the year following the commencement 
of the tenth perfecution. For Conftantine, when 
emperor, in an addrefs to the inhabitants of the 

eaftern 



103 



caftern provinces, ^sljs, in reference to the fuffer- 
ings of the Chriftian martyrs, " that the hght of 
day itfelf was vsikd in forrow at the portentous 

light, rijz jxr.v i^fxi^a, otvrr] rco irsvB'si ^ccv[xccrog svixaAuTT- 

T£To." Eufeb. De Vita Conllant. Perhaps ^ocvi^oc- 
ros for 

John Malala, I have lince founds mentions, that 
in the reign of Diocletian (but he gives no indica- 
tion of the year) there was a great darknefs the 
whole day. And Idatius (probably the lingle au- 
thority of Du Frefnoy) has limilar words relative 
to the darknefs of 291. Tillemont fuppofes him 
to mean the eclipfe of the fun, which, according 
to calculation, happened on Tuefday the 15th of 
May, in that year. But the expreffion clearly re- 
fers to another kind of darknefs of much longer 
duration, and which the writers, who record it, 
conlider as preternatural. 

Conflantius Chlorus is faid above to have been 
made Csefar in 291. So fay Idatius, Jerome, and 
Profper, who have been followed by Petavius in 
his Chronology, Valerius in his Notes on Eufe- 
bius, and Cardinal Norris. Tillemont, indeed, ad- 
verts to a fpeech of Galerius, the colleague of Con- 
ftantius, where, in 305, he fays, that he had then 
been fifteen years a Caefar ; but, the Commentator 
fubjoins, that he then was in a paffion. It is very 
immaterial to the prefent purpofe, whether it was 
in 291, or 292. I chiefly rely on the other dark- 
H 4 nefs, 



104 



nefs, mentioned by Conftantine, which I am iiow 
more convinced is not a figurative expreffion, but 
a real event, becaufe the tears of the earth, and 
the lamentations of the univerfe," which immedi- 
ately precede in the context, are reported by Eufe- 
bius elfewhere, in his Account of the Martyrs of 
Paleftine, to have really happened about the end 
of the year 308, or beginning of 309, in the fixth 
or feventh year of the lafb general perfecution. 
The darknefs probably was ftill later. And with 
the death of Maximian Herculius, who, on the 
difcovery of his plots againft Conftantine the Great, 
deftroyed himfelf very foon after this period, began 
the downfall of thofe heathen emperors, who had 
perfecuted the Chrillians, and whofe tragical ends, 
one after another, made way for the triumphant 
eftablilhment of the Chriftian religion. Idatius, 
in his Fafti Conf. m.entions an extraordinary dark- 
nefs in 318, the year before the defection of Lici- 
nius. Amm. Marcellinus mentions another in 359, 
or 360, lib. XXX. c. 3. 

It fhould not be forgotten, in explaining this 
portion of the prophecy, that the period from the 
eledlion of Diocletian to the acceffion of Conftan- 
tine is particularly deficient in contemporary hifto- 
ry. The great colledlion of Latin hiftorians, in 
two folio volumes, has not a finele writer who 
lived near the time. After Capitolinus, Lampri- 
dius, Trebelhus Pollio, Vopifcus, and others, who 

carry 



105 

carry us down regularly to Numerianus and Cari- 
nas, there is a chafm till we come to the mutilated 
work of x\mmianus Marcellinus, which, as we now 
have it, begins with the aflumption of the purple 
by Julian. The Life of Conftantine, by Eufebius, 
in Greek, and the Hiftory of Eunapius, as we have 
it in Zolimus, are our principal guides, even in the 
reign of that illuftrious prince ; and what related 
to Diocletian's reign in Zolimus is loft, while 
thofe of his immediate fucceflbrs are fhort and in- 
diftin6l. The abridgments of Eutropius and Au- 
relius Vi(5lor can have but little weight. 

Mr. Whitaker's illuftration of the fymbolical 
language of this palTage, and its application to the 
event, as witnefTed by Mr. Gibbon, is new and 
happy. To the obfervations of that commentator 
may be added, an anecdote of Julian, recorded by 
Ammianus Marcellinus. The hiftorian tells us, 
(lib. xxiii. c. 5.) that Julian, on his Perlian expe- 
dition, Hopped feveral days at Carrae, whence the 
roads to the different quarters of the Perlian do- 
minions feparated. He here made a folemn facri- 
fice, it fhould feem for the lafi: time, to the Moon, 
which vv^as worfhipped with particular honour in 
that place. Afterwards, his mind, troubled with 
the dreams of the night, prefaged fome impending 
difafter, whence he and his diviners declared, that 
the following day ought to be obferved. And on that 
ve^py day, the 1 8th of March, (adds the hifborian,) 

it 



106 



it was fubfequently founds that the principal tem- 
ple of Apollo, or the Sun, on Mount Palatine in 
Rome, was deftroyed by fire. It funk in afhes 
never to rife again. The E7nT0|wy) X^ovcov alfo fays, 
that Julian, at the approach of death, exclaimed, n 

Yi?\l[y OtTTCoXBCaS lovXiOivov. 

And after thefe things 1 f aw four angels fianding on 
the four corners of the earth, holding the four 
winds of the earth. Rev. vii. i. 

See Mede's judicious explanation, not fufficiently 
» exprefled by Bifhop Newton. That the winds, in 
prophetical language, mean wars, and hoftile in- 
curlions, he fhews from Jeremiah xlix. 36 — li. i. 
and xviii. 17. as well as from Daniel vii. 2, 3. 
The propriety of the fymbol may alfo be illuf- 
trated from a paffage in Claudian, who, defcribing 
Rufinus letting loofe the barbarians, that in the 
Revelations follow under the firft trumpet, ufes 
this very limihtude : 

Ventis veluti fi frsena remittat 
T^olus, abrupto gentes fic objice fudit 
Laxavitque viam bell is. 

As when ^olus unchains 
The ftruggling winds, and throws up all the reins; 
So did he pour the nations from afar. 
Each barrier burft, and gave a loofe to war. 



And 



107 



j4nd I heard the number of them which were fealed: 
and there were fealed an hundred and forty and 
four thoufand of all the tribes of the children of 
Ifrael. Of the tribe of Juda were fealed twelve 
thoufand^ &c. Rev. vii. 4^ 5. 

There is in Mede's Commentary a very inge- 
nious paffage on the myftical meaning of the 
names of the tribes, as they are here delignated 
and arranged. Though fome may think it too re- 
fined, it ought not to have been omitted in any 
regular explanation of this prophetical book. Yet 
Newton has paffed it over in filence, akhough he 
has copied from the fame enlightened fource fome 
of his detached remarks on the fubjedl. We can- 
not but fuppofe a fecret and recondite reafon for 
the difference fo remarkable here in the denomina- 
tion of two tribes, and in the order of enumerating 
all. 

Mr. Whitaker conceives the miferies infli(5led 
on the truly faithful, not by heathen perfecu- 
tors only, but by the barbarians alfo, who had em- 
braced Chriftianity under the Arian herefy, to be 
alluded to in this chapter, and quotes from Gib- 
bon a long paffage defcriptive of what a large 
body of the orthodox fulFered, who were delivered 
by order of Hunneric, king of the Vandals, to the 
Moors of the defert. Comment, p. 77. 

But it Ihould be remembered, that the fealing, 

her^ 



108 



here mentioned, immediately fucceeds the peace of 
the church under Conftantine, in the beginning of 
the fourth century, while the fufferings of the or- 
thodox, by order of Hunneric, took place at a 
fubfequent period, between the years 477 and 
478. 

Such licentious interpretations, confounding all 
order of the events, and all regard to time, afford 
great opening for cavillers. How much more hke a 
comment on this feal does the following pafTage from 
Sulpicius Severus read ; " Principe Chrilliano li- 
bertatem atque exemplum fidei mundus acceperat : 
fed longe atrocius perkidim cundlis eccleliis ilia 
pace generatum. Namque tum haerelis Arii pro- 
rupit, totumque orbem, inve6lo errore, turbaverat. 
Etenim duobus Ariis, acerrimis perfidiae hujus 
au6loribus, imperator etiam depravatur ; dumque 
libi religionis officium videtur implere, vim perfe- 
cutionis exercuit." Hift. lib. ii. c. 50. See alfo the 
fame writer's account of the fubfequent triumph of 
Arianifm, at the council of Conftantinople, in 369, 
not long before the death of Conftantius. Ita 
optimis facerdotibus, aut metu territis, aut exilio 
dedudlis, perfidiag paucorum cundli conceflerant." 
lb. c. (.0, Indeed, as to the extent of the herefy, 
he repeatedly fays, that it had infedled the whole 
globe; or, in other words, the whole Roman em- 
pire. He diftindlly reckons up Italy, Illyricum, 
the Eaft, Gaul, and Spain. The rife, progrefs, 

and 



109 

and diiFulion of Prifcillianiftn are then related by 
him. It is reprefented as a branch of Gnofticifm ; 
and St. Auguftin, and other writers, add, mixed 
with Manichaeifm. He juftly cenfures the over- 
heated zeal with which fome of the orthodox party 
perfecuted thefe deluded men, even to death ; and 
in conclulion tells us, that in confequence, from 
the year 385 to 400, there had raged the fierceft 
flames of religious difcord, which had thrown 
every thing into confulion. Upon this ftate of 
public ferment, and mutual animolity, came the 
diflurbances and wars of the Goths under Alarick, 
Gainas, Tribigild, Rhadagaifus, Godigilil, and 
others. The Goths within the pale, and adjoining 
to it, were all Arians, and as fuch were fubjedled 
within the Roman jurifdidlion to the laws againft 
heretics, which prohibited them from enjoying any 
of the privileges attached to the profeffion of the 
orthodox religion, from ordaining priefts, or teach- 
ing their tenets, and from having any public or 
private place of worfhip, by whatever name, 
under a very heavy penalty. See Juftinian's Code, 
lib. i. tit. 5. de Haeret. c. i, 2, 3. And how ftridlly 
thefe laws were enforced we learn from an anecdote 
of Chryfoftom : When Gainas and his Goths 
were, in a manner, mafters of Conftantinople, and 
had fo far fubdued the Emperor Arcadius, that he 
furrendered his principal favourites into their hands, 
on his petitioning, that he and his Arian Goths 

might 



110 



might have one church affigned them in the city 
for their ufe^ the zealous bifhop, producing the 
law, firmly refufed the requeft, not without re- 
proaches to him who made it. That Rhadagaifus, 
who is called a Pagan, derived any aid in his inva- 
fion from the heretics, does not, that I know, di- 
redlly appear. But there is a ftrong prefumption 
that fuch was fuppofed to be the fa6l ; becaufe 
one of the firft laws, which Honorius made after 
the defeat of Rhadagafius, and almoft on the firft 
intelligence of the irruption of Godigilil, at the 
very beginning of the following year, was a law of 
new and unprecedented feverity againft the Mani- 
chaeans (or PrifciUianifts) and Donatifls. Thefe 
herelies were declared to be public crimes, attended 
with a forfeiture of all the criminal's efiedls : he 
was incapacitated from fucceeding under any title 
whatever ; he could neither buy nor fell, hold by 
gift or bargain. A Manichaean convidl could not 
make any teftamentary difpolition of his property, 
nor could his children inherit, without recanta- 
tion ; and thofe were alfo obnoxious to the law, 
who fhould harbour and protedV them in their 
houfes. This feems copied from fome of the old 
perfecutions of Chriflians, and, perhaps, ferved as 
a model for the fourth council of Lateran, which 
diredled limilar rigours againffc the iVlbigenfes, 
who were unjuftly ftigmatized by the Roman 
church as Manichaeans. That this law of Hono- 
rius 



Ill 



rius (which may be found in Juftinian's Cod. de 
Haeret. hb. iv.) had a connexion with the political 
Hate of the country, is rendered highly probable, 
not only from its feverity, which has upon it the 
ftamp of temporary preffure, but alfo from the 
tenor of the two principal laws, which are neareft 
to it in date ; for they are evidently of that kind. 
The next is one relating to the army, and plainly 
defigned to conciliate them, which is followed by 
another, regulating the finances, and courting po- 
pularity by economy, in checking the too lavifh 
exemptions, which had been granted from the 
payment of taxes by favoured individuals of the 
emperor's court. 

And when he had opened the feventh feal, there was 
Jilence in heaven about the fp ace of half aji hour. 

Rev. viii. i. 

The feventh feal I underftand to comprehend 
the whole fucceffion of Chriftian emperors, down 
to the future deftrudlion of what is called the holy 
Roman empire, that head of the beaft, which had 
the deadly wound, and was again healed. This 
fucceffion begins with Jovian. " As foon as he 
had afcended the throne," obferves Mr. Gibbon, 

he tranfmitted a circular epiftle to all the go- 
vernors of provinces ; in which he confeffed the 
divine truth, and fecured the legal efhablifhment 
Qf the Chriftian religion." Under him," adds the 

hiftorian 



112 



hillorian in another place, " Chriftianity obtained 
an eafy and lafting vi6lory; and, as foon as the 
fmile of royal Patronage was withdrawn, the genius 
of paganifm, which had been fondly raifed and 
cherifhed by the arts of Julian, funk irrecoverably 
to the duft." The undifturbed tranquillity of his 
fhort reign, which lafted little more than half a 
year, may not unapdy be fuppofed to be intended 
in the " lilence for about the fpace of half an 
hour:" but the difadvantageous peace, which he 
was forced to make with Perfia, '* has been juftly 
confidered," fays Mr. Gibbon, " as a memorable 
sera in the decline and fall of the Roman empire." 
It was probably this proof of weaknefs in the Ro- 
man government which, more than the removal of 
the terror infpired by Julian, encouraged all the 
northern nations to attack the empire, which they 
foon did, in a manner, by common confent. The 
trumpets are then put into the hands of the angels. 
What follows refpe6ling the prayers of the faints, 
and the fire taken from the altar to be thrown 
upon the earth, may receive fome illuftration from 
another paffage or two of Mr. Gibbon. The 
Chriftians," he remarks, were unanimous in the 
loud and lincere applaufe, which they beftowed on 
the pious fuccefTor of Julian. But the peace of 
the church immediately revived thefe eager dif- 
putes, which had been fufpended during the feafon 
of perfecution." There is a particular anecdote in 

the 



113 



the Hiftory of Jovian^ which might with pro- 
priety be conlidered as almolt a literal accom- 
plifhment of the offering up of the prayers of the 
faints, with incenfe, mentioned in verfes 3, 4., and 
5 ; and it is pointed out by Mr. Gibbon to our 
attention, for the fake of a fneer at Athanalius, as 
not pOiTeffing a prophetic fpirit. In a public 
letter, which Theodoret has preferved, the intre- 
pid veteran of the faith," and the orthodox bi- 
Ihops affembled with him, addrefTed to the em- 
peror a fort of wifh or affurance of a long and 
peaceful reign in reward of his true devotion. But 
their prayers were not favourably heard. That 
prince, who, by his own perfonal virtues, and flill 
more, perhaps, by his judicious choice of minifliers 
and officers of ftate, which extorted praife even 
from his enemy Ammianus Marcellinus, promifed 
to fecure the profperity and flability of the em- 
pire, was quickly fnatched away ; fire was cafh 
upon the earth ; and the refl of the predidled 
judgments rapidly fucceeded. 

^nd I/aw the /even angels which Jlood before God; 
and to them were given /even trumpets. 

Rev. viii. 2. 

All thefe feven trumpets are clearly included 
under the feventh feal. That there might be no 
miflake in this refpedl, as if the feven trumpets 
were feparate, and diilindl branches of the prophe- 

I cy. 



114 



Cj, the firft thing mentioned as done, on the 
opening of the feal, is the giving of the trumpets 
to the angels. Now of thefe trumpets the moft 
important, and plainly diftinguifhed as fuch, are 
the three woe trumpets, as they are ufually called ; 
but it is lingular that Mr. Whitaker, in his Com- 
mentary, paffes over tvjo of the three in lilence. 
The fifth and fixth relate very little to the wejlern^ 
and diredliy to the eaftern empire, for they predidl 
the incurfions of the Saracens and Turks; the 
former of whom feverely afflidled, and the latter 
deftroyed, the eaftern, but neither made any conli- 
derable imprefiion on the weftern empire. 

And the angel took the cenfer, and filled It with fir 
of the altar, and cafi it into the earth. 

Rev. viii. 5. 

" The ardor of Damafus and Urfinus," fays 
Mr. Gibbon, " to feize the epifcopal feat of Rome, 
furpafTed the ordinary meafure of human ambi- 
tion ; they contended with the rage of party. The 
quarrel was maintained by the wounds and death 
of their followers ; and the praefedl, unable to ap- 
peafe or refill the tumult, was conllrained, by fu- 
perior violence, to retire into the fuburbs. Dama- 
fus prevailed. One hundred and thirty-feven dead 
bodies were found in the Bafilica, where the Chrif- 
tians held their religious alTemblies ; and it was 
long before the angry minds of the people refumed 

their 



115 



their accuftomed tranquillity." c. 25. The fadl 
here alluded to happened in 367 ; and the motive 
affigned by the hiftorian for thefe fierce and obfti- 
nate contefts is drawn from the previoully exilling 
ftate of the church. 

Gregory of Nazianzus (Orat. xxxii. p. 526.) 
paints in ftrong colours the pride and luxury of 
the prelates, who reigned in the imperial cities ; 
their gilt cars, fiery fleeds, and numerous trains. 
The crowd gave way to them as to a wild beafl. 

But the more general corruption of the eccleli- 
aflics is befl attefted by a law of Valentinian, in 
the year 370, prohibiting eccleliafidcs and monks 
from frequenting the houfes of widows and virgins, 
and annulling all donations or legacies given to 
any direcfor, by the liberaUty of his fpiritual 
daughter. A fubfequent regulation, it fhould 
feem, extended the fame provifions to nuns and 
bifhops, and rendered all perfons of the eccleliafti- 
cal order w^holly incapable of receiving any tefta- 
mentary bequeft. Ambrofe and Jerome both ad- 
mit the neceflity of the law. The latter fays, 
Pudet dicere, facerdotes idolorum, mimi, et au- 
rigae, et fcorta haereditates capiunt ; foUs clericis ac 
monachis hac lege prohibetur. Et non prohibetur 
a perfecutoribus, fed a principibus Chriflianis. Nec 
de lege queror ; fed doleo, cur meruerimiis hanc 
legem." 

Thefe paflages and authorities are all borrowed 
I a from 



from Gibbon. And I think they fully bear upon 
the fubjedl. This law of Valentinian is dated only 
five years after the great earthquake, when the cen- 
fer was caft away. And fuch a fevere brand, im- 
preffed, not by a perfecutor, as Jerome remarks, 
but by a Chriftian prince, and one too who had 
begun his reign by an univerfal toleration, clearly 
indicates an adult and general abufe, fuch as five 
years cannot be fuppofed to have generated and 
foflered to maturity and ftrength. 

And there were voices, and tJiunderings, and lights 
nings, and an earthquake. And the /even angels 
which had the /even trumpets prepared themfelves 
to found. The jirjl angel founded^ and there fol- 
lowed hail and fire mingled with hlood. 

Rev. viii. 5, 6, 7. 

«^ The year 365," obferves Mr. Mede, was 
ominoufiy marked with that univerfal^ ftupendous, 
and never to be fampled earthquake, whereby the 
waters of the fea were rolled out of their channels, 
and left fhips hanging on the tops of houfes." 
And for this he quotes Ammianus Marcellinus, 
lib. xxvi. c. 31. who, by the way, does not omit 
" the thunderings and lightnings," ufhering in this 
great convulfion of nature, " denfitate prasvia ful- 
gurum acrius vibratorum." The words adduced 
by Mede are thefe ; " Horrendi tremores per om- 
nem orbis ambitum graffati funt fubito, quales, 

nee 



117 



nec fabulae, nec veridicag nobis antiquitates €xpo- 
nunt." See alfo Jerome's Life of Hilarion. 

Mr. Mede then goes on to fay ; From this 
time forward all the nations on every lide feem, as 
it were^ with one confent, to have confpired the 
ruin of the empire." The language of his margi- 
nal authority from Marcellinus is moft flriking ; 
it reads almoft like a commentary on this part of 
the Revelation. Hoc tempore/' fays he, velut 
per univerfum orbem Romanum bellicum cruenti- 
bus buccinis excitae gentes faeviffimae limites libi 
proximos perfultabant." The Alcmanni were the 
firfl. The news reached Valentinian, at Paris, 
about the firft of Nov. 365. 

I would, accordingly, date the hail ftorm on the 
founding of the firft trumpet from this period. 
And, indeed, Claudian very nearly agrees with this, 
in the well-known lines, which have been fre- 
quendy quoted. Thirty years had paffed, (the poet 
tells us, in the year 403,) 

Ex quo jam patrios gens haec oblita Triones, 
Atque Iftrum tranfvecta femel, veftigia fixit 
Threicio funefta folo, feu fata vocabant. 
Sen gravis ira Deum, feriem meditata ruinis. 
Ex illo, quocunque vagos impegit Erynnis, 
Grandinis, aut morbi ritu, per devia rerum 
Praecipites, per claufa ruunt, 8cc. 

De bello Getuo. 



Let me alfo add^ that, in the year 367, five years 
I 3 after 



118 



after the great earthquake, we find, in the Pafchal 
Chronicle, the firfh mention of thefe extraordinary- 
hail ftorms, which occurred at intervals, during 
the whole time of the irruptions of the Goths, and 
other northern nations, down to the death of Ala- 
ric. They were fuch as to be regarded in the 
light of portents at the time, and recorded as fuch 
in hiftory. Contemporary with this firfi: ominous 
ftorm was the breaking out of the Gothic war, 
which Mr. Gibbon points out to our notice as 

a preliminary fhep of the approaching decline 
and fall of the empire." 

Idatius, in his Chronicle, alfo has preferved the 
fame fadl of the remarkable ftorm in this year, dif- 
fering only a month in the date. Socrates, in his 
Eccleliaftical Hiftory, thinks it of fufficient im- 
portance to make the fubje6l of a feparate chapter, 
in conjundlion with the earthquake, by which Ni- 
caea was defooyed in the following year. He fays 

it was '^Si^CTTAYi^Yi; yji-XCcZa. AiS'Ot? £^^£|571f. 

About the year 373, according to Tillemont, 
there was another plague of hail," at leaft in the 
diocefe of Nazianzus ; on which occalion the fa- 
mous Gregory, then acting as coadjutor to his fa- 
ther, preached a fermon, exhorting his flock to 
humble themfelves before this vilitation of Provi- 
dence, and feek pardon for their offences. The 
next year a war broke out with the Quadi. 

Philoflorgius does not diftindlly mark the time 

of 



119 



of the hail ftorms^ which he defcribes^ (lib. ii. c. 7.) 
but from the context it may be gathered, that they 
happened towards the clofe of the fame century. 
They were probably the fame to which Claudian 
alludes, in the opening of his fatirical poem on the 
Confulfhip of Eutropius, in 399, where he enume- 
rates " the dire tempefls of ftones," lapdwn d'lras 
hiemes, among the prodigies, at v/hich the world 
fhould ceafe any longer to wonder. Towards the 
end of the preceding year, or the beginning of 
this, it was, that Alaric was made mafter-general of 
lUyrium, and firft folemnly proclaimed king of the 
Vifigoths. 

The fame poetical hiftorian, in his verfes on the 
Gothic war, wherein he celebrates the vidlory of 
Stihcho over Alaric, in the year 403, reckons 
The ftrong pelting of the pitilefs hail 

^mong the recent ligns, which had fpread a panic 
in Rome, on the approach of the northern chief- 
Jain. 

tunc anni figna prioris, 

Et fi quod fortaiTe quies neglexerit omen. 
Add it cura no vis ; lapidofos grandinis idus 
Molitafque examen apes, paffimque crematas 
Perbaccbata domos ?mllis incendia caiijjis, 
Et nunquam coelo fpedatum impune Cometam. 

Defeated as he was at Pollentia, Alaric broke 
through the pafTes of the Apennines, ravaged the 
fruitful plains of Tufcany, and approached the 
I 4 gates 



120 



gates of Rome ; but Stilicho marched to fave the 
capital, and at length was contented to purchafe 
the abfence of the barbarians. 

The laft of thefe portentous hail ftorms, which 
is recorded in the Pafchal Chronicle, though that 
work is continued down to the year 628, (and the 
minute induftry of Tillemont has found none later 
in his compilation, which reaches beyond the end 
of the century), happened in the year 404. And 
at that very time the dark cloud mufi: have been 
beginning to gather on the coafh of the Baltic, 
which, in 405 or 406, (for hiftorians differ in the 
date,) burft upon the upper Danube. This was 
the invafion under Rhadagaifus, from the ruins of 
whofe difcomfited and fhattered army ilTued the 
Suevi, the Alani, the Vandals, and the Burgun- 
dians, and, paffing the Rhine, cftablifhed them- 
felves within the Roman territories, whence they 
never afterwards retreated ; an event which, Mr. 
Gibbon truly obferves, may be conlidered as the 
fall of the empire in the countries beyond the 
Alps. The barriers," adds he, which had fo 
long feparated the favage and the civilized nations 
of the earth, were from that fatal moment levelled 
with the ground." 

The next fymbol of thefe deftrudlive irruptions, 
mentioned in the prophecy, is Jire. And accord* 
ingly we fhall find, within the fame period, feve- 
ral inflances of conflagrations, reckoned ominous 

at 



121 



at the time, and appearances of fiery clouds in the 
heavens, which fpread terror and difmay. Zoli- 
mus, a heathen, informs us, that on the death of 
Valentinian, in 375, a flafh of hghtning fet fire to 
the palace and public market of Sirmium, which 
were burnt down, and the next year the Goths 
were firfi: received amicably by Valens into the 
adjacent provinces, and, foon after revolting, held 
the lands of Moefia as conquerors, and defolated 
Thrace. The hillorian juft quoted does not 
point to this particular calamity, which followed ; 
but he obferves in general, that men of fi:rong 
judgments, in fuch fubjedls, beUeved the confla- 
gration at Sirmium to prognofticate evil to the 
ftate. 

It has been conjecHiured that the hail fi:orms, 
mentioned by Philoftorgius, might be the fame 
with thofe which Claudian feems to place about 
397 or 398. But probably they were rather ear- 
lier. For he feems to connect them with the 
comet, which appeared in 389: and in that year 
Count Marcellinus notes, that for two fucccflive 
days there fell fuch furious firorms of hail, as to do 
very confiderable damage, not only to the trees, 
but even to the flocks in the fields. As, therefore, 
Philoftorgius puts the flaflies of fire'* before the 
hail, that phaenomenon cannot well have been later 
than that year. 

In 390, Count Marcellin and Tyro Profper re- 

latCj, 



122 



late, that a pillar of fire appeared over Conftanti- 
nople for thirty days. 

The next year the European Huns, as we are 
told by the authors of the Univerfal Hiftory, for 
the firft time palTed the Danube, and, in conjunc- 
tion with other barbarous nations, invaded the 
eaftern empire. They feem to have colle6led the 
fadl from Claudian, in his panegyric on Stihcho, 
who is there celebrated for the fevere revenge 
which he took for the death of his friend Promo - 
tus, killed in 391 by the Baftarnae. The hero is 
preferred to Achilles in Homer, and ^neas in 
Virgil, becaufe he facrificed not an individual, 
but a whole nation, and becaufe he had not the aid 
of invulnerable arms. Then follow fomc lines, 
beautifully defcriptive of the different barbarians, 
w^ho formed the combined army of the enem.y, and 
who, he fays, had been for a long time defolating 
Thrace. 

tot barbara folus 

Milllajampridem miferam vaftantia Thracem 
Faucibus exigu^ vallis conclufa tenebas. 
Non te terrifonus ftridor venientis Alani, 
Nec vaga Chunorum feritas, Don falce Gelorms, 
Non arcu pepulere Get^^^ non Sarmata cento. 

The fingle might of thy viftorious mind 
Held in a valley's narrow bounds confin'd 
The mingled myriads of barbaric race, 
That long pour'd havoc o'er afflicted Thrace. 

Nor 



123 



Kor thee the rufhing Alans hideous yell. 
And roving Hun's wild onfet could repel. 
The mangling falchion of the Gelon foe. 
The long Sarmatian pike, or Getic how. 

The poet afterwards proceeds to relate the fhort 
ftay of Stilicho in the capital, and the many win- 
ters which he fpent in Thracian campaigns, pre- 
vious to the death of Theodofius, a context, 
which, with every allowance for poetical exagge^ 
ration, leads us neceflarily to place the achieve- 
ment above recorded in the end of 391, or in 39a 
at lateft ; and let it be remembered, that the bar- 
barians had long defolated Thrace." Indeed 
we have the exprefs authority of Zofimus, that a 
body of revolted Goths, who had lurked in the 
woods and faftneffes of Macedonia and ThefTaly, 
taking advantage of the civil war with Maximus 
in 389, had openly ravaged thefe provinces; but 
afterwards retiring, they were ftill fo troublefome, 
as to induce the emperor to go againft them in 
perfon, during the fummer of 391, in his way to 
Conftantinople : a date of things, which is in 
fome meafure witneffed by a refcript addrelFed to 
the inhabitants of Macedonia, in the July of that 
year, permitting them to refill by arms, and kill 
all perfons, even foldiers, who might commit any 
trefpafs on their grounds, or lie in wait by night. 
It may be added, that, at the head of the calami^ 
ties confequent on the comet, Philoftorgus rec- 
kons 



124 



kons the flaughter and depredations committed by 
the barbarians, and, after he has then in general 
enumerated all the prodigies of that time, goes on 
to particularize the incurlions of the Huns. 

The year after the death of Theodofius, which 
happened in 395, Mr. Gibbon ftates, that the 
Gothic nation was in arms. " The barriers of the 
Danube," he fays, were thrown open ; the fa- 
vage warriors of Scythia iffued from their forefts. 
The various troops of barbarians, that gloried in 
the Gothic name, were irregularly fpread from the 
woody fhores of Dalmatia to the walls of Conftan- 
tinople." C. 30. It was then that Alaric, having 
paffed the ftraights of Thermopylae, fpread devafta- 
tion over Greece, and left " the deep and bloody 
traces of his march," which, according to Mr. 
Gibbon, were fo long vilible in that unfortunate 
country. And fuch were the miferies which the 
Huns occalioned at the fame time in Alia, and 
even to the very walls of Confbantinople, that Je- 
rome, writing foon after from Paleftine, dates the 
commencement of their ravages from this year; 
though it is manifeft from Claudian, that, before 
the murder of Rufinus in 395, thefe barbarous in- 
vaders had made an afflidling progrefs. Were 
then thefe difafters preceded or accompanied by 
any of the emblems, ^hich the prophecy points 
out ? We learn from Count Marcellinus and 
Profper, that the city of Conftantinople was ex- 
ceedingly 



125 



ceedingly alarmed this year by a pillar of fire^ 
which fhone over the city in an awful and tremen- 
dous manner. St. Auftin, in one of his fermons 
many years after, gives us a ftill fuller account of 
the phaenomenon, and he exprefles himfelf in terms 
which evince that it had made a ftrong and lafting 
impreffion. Many of his flock, he fays, and polli- 
bly fome of his adlual hearers, faw this portent. 
He defcribes it as a cloud of fire, fmall at firft, as 
it afcended from the eaftern horizon, but increaf- 
ing as it advanced, till it extended over the whole 
city ; and it was accompanied with a fulphureous 
fmell. A ftory was quickly propagated, that the 
vifitation of divine wrath, now impending, had 
been revealed and predicted. The churches were 
immediately crowded ; fome hurried thither to 
confefs their offences, and to fupplicate mercy ; 
others, with fudden conviiflion, to make confellion 
of their new faith, and receive the feal of baptifm. 
At length, after fome hours fpent in panic and 
prayer, the cloud began to be diminifhed, and by 
degrees entirely difperfed. See Tillemont on this 
year. 

It was accidentally omitted, but fiiould have 
been remarked above, as characterizing this year, 
that Arcadius, by an edi6l addrefled to Caefarius, 
commanded the fenates and people refpedlively of 
all the cities and towns to repair the old and de- 
cayed walls, or, if they had none before, to build 

new 



126 



new fortifications for their defence^ and to defray 
the charge by a local tax^ impofed and levied for 
that efpecial purpofe. 

The latter end of the year 398 was critical to 
the fortunes of Alaric, and the next year was 
marked by the rebellion of the Oftrogoths, under 
Trigibild. Here then we find a concurrence of all 
the fymbols^ hail and fire mingled with blood. 
All thefe are enumerated by Claudian, in his poem 
againft Eutropius, as portents immediately preced- 
ing, or accompanying, his promotion to the conful- 
fhip in 399. 

Et laptdum diras hiemes, nimloque mlnacetri 
Sanguineo rubuiffe Jovem, puteofque cruore 
Mutatos Lib. i. 

Scilicet hsc Stygiae praemittunt figna forores^ 
Et fibi jam tradi populos hoc confule gaudent* 
Mox oritur diverfa lues ; hinc Miilciher ignes 
^parferai, hinc vi6^a proruperat objice Nereus.— 
Utque femel patuit monftris iter, omina tempus 
Kada fuum properant; nafci turn decolor imber, &c. 

Lib. ii. 

Profper, I rriufi: obferve, mentions^ under the year 
397, that, after a fucceffion of earthquakes, which 
lafted for many days, the Iky feemed to be on 
fire. 



127 



And the third /)^r/ of the trees were burnt up. 

Rev. viii. 

Mr. Mede explains the third part under the 
firft, fecond, third, and fourth trumpets here men- 
tioned, as well as under the fixth trumpet in c. ix. 
and alfo with reference to the prevalence of the red 
dragon in c. xii. to mean limply the Roman em- 
pire, which, he fays, was about one third of the 
habitable globe then known. But it has ftruck 
me as a conliderable difficulty, that, while in fomc 
of thofe palTages, as for inflance, under the fourth 
and lixth trumpets, a mere moiety of the original 
Roman territory is clearly defcribed under the de- 
nomination of a third part, (the fourth trumpet un- 
doubtedly relating to the deftru6lion of the weflern^ 
and the lixth trumpet to that of the eaftern empire 
alone ;) yet upon the breaking of the fourth feal, in 
c. vi. ver. 8. the affi6lion of the Roman empire in 
general, before its divilion, is reprefented as affedl- 
ing but fourth part of the earth. It is true this 
feems, from the palTages which Mr. Whitaker ap- 
politely cites from Mr. Gibbon, to have been pro- 
bably very near to the hteral fadl of the accom- 
plifhment. Still I think the phrafe, a fourth 
part," would hardly have been ufed in charadler- 
izing evils, which, according to Mr. Gibbon, ex- 
tended throughout the Roman world, and a plague, 
which raged in every province, every city, and al- 
moft every family, if the fame empire was meant 

t9 



128 



to be defignated elfewhere, as a third part of the 
earth, from the proportion of its population. Nay, 
to call the eaftern or the weftern empire a third part, 
(which by the way was but the fixth part,) and, at 
the fame time, to call both together, under Maxi- 
min, only a fourth part, feems to be an irrecon- 
cileable confulion, which I know not how to be- 
lieve of the Holy Spirit. We muft, therefore, 
feek fome other reafon than its proportion of popu- 
lation or territory for the denomination of " a third 
part,'* and, if we can, a reafon which would be 
equally applicable to the whole, or to either divi- 
lion of it, and which did not apply to it at all in 
the days of Maximin, and his immediate fuccef- 
fors, under the fourth feal. In that cafe, we may 
fairly and naturally underftand the paflage of a 
fourth part of the earth (c. vi. ver. 8.) in its lite- 
ral fenfe. Now, I obferve, that the Roman em- 
pire is firfl: defcribed by the appellation of a third 
part under the feventh feal, that is, under the fuc- 
ceffion of Chriftian princes. Have we then any 
authority for fuppofing the third part to lignify 
not properly the Roman empire, but a principal 
Chriftian ftate, and fo the Roman empire when 
whole, or either divilion of it, when the eafh was 
feparated from the weft? And to this I can an- 
fwer, that there is undoubted authority to that ef- 
fedl. For Ifrael was called by the Jewifh Rab- 
bies, the third part ^ and the third people , as may be 

fully 



129 



fully feen in Wetftein's notes on this place ; and, 
throughout the Revelation, by Jews are intended 
the true Ifraelites, the Chriftians. If I am not too 
partial to my own interpretation, there is but one 
lingle paflage in the prophecy, which can fuggeft 
the flighteft helitation. That is, however, the 
very paflage, which is the actual balls of Mr. 
Mede's interpretation. The dragon, in chap. xii. 
is faid with his tail to have fwept the third part of 
the ftars of heaven, and to have call them to the 
earth ; which he underftands to mean, that the 
heathen Roman empire fubjedled a third part of 
the princes and dynafties of the known world to its 
dominion. Will not thefe figures, however, ad- 
mit of another meaning ? And is not that meaning 
confiftent with the notion, that the third part al- 
ludes to fome Chrijiian oeconomy ? The tail^ as 
appears from Ifaiah, the prophet that teaches 
lies, he is the tail," c. ix. 15.) may typify falfe 
teachers; as well as generally, according to Ach- 
met, followers and dependents of power: and the 
tails of the locufts, in chap. ix. are commonly un- 
derfiiood in the former fenfe. Who then are the 
Jiars of heaven F Certainly a Jlar is an ordinary 
type of a prince, or fome illuftrious perfon in the 
ftate ; and fo I would, therefore, interpret it always 
under the feals, which mark the leading events in 
the fucceflion of temporal power, down to the 
final deftrudtion of Rome, and the eftablifhment 

K of 



130 



of the kingdom of Chrift upon earth. But it i§ 
equally a proper type of any illuftrious perfon in 
the church, introdudory to the appearance of that 
tyrannical monfter of civil and eccleliaftical power, 
which ftill has his throne in Rome. And the 
crown of twelve Jiars, which the woman wears, is 
well explained both by Bifhop Newton and Mr, 
Whitaker as pointing to the twelve Apojlles. Mr. 
Whitaker has alfo added an authority from a text 
of Daniel, in which it is faid, they who turn many 
to righteoufnefs fhall fhine as the ftars for ever and 
ever." May I then be permitted to propofc, that 
what is faid of the dragon in chap. xii. 4. be inter- 
preted of the followers and partizans of Paganifm 
in power, including the lying teachers of its doc- 
trines, (unlefs from the lingle text of Ifaiah any one 
would rather confine the fenfe exclufively to them,) 
fweeping away the lights of the church, and hold- 
ing them in the moft abfolute fubjedlion ? And 
this appears to me not only to be confiftent with 
the notion relative to the third part, which I have 
taken, though differently applied, from Wetftein^ 
and more directly to arife out of the context, which 
immediately precedes in the twelfth chapter, but 
to give additional force to the fequel, where the 
dragon in his turn is cafl down. The conqueft of 
a third part of the known world, by the power of 
heathen Rome, has nothing to do with the llory 
of the woman, having taken place before the 

epoch 



131 



epoch of the commencement of that vilion. It 
would be at bell a circumilance of defcription and 
identification only, certainly not necelTary, and 
therefore not likely, to be introduced. But what 
I would fubflitute is important to the fubjedt it- 
felf. 

On confulting more particularly the Jewifh au- 
thorities cited by Wetftein, I perceive that moft 
of them, not all, are expolitions of a palTage con- 
tained in the eighth and ninth verfes of the pro- 
phet Zechariah. Thefe, together with the preced- 
ing verfe, are admitted by the beft interpreters to 
form a diftin(5l fedlion ; but Dr. Blayney thinks 
not a feparate fubjedl of predicftion. In his opi- 
nion, the reference which Chrift himfelf made to 
the words, " I will fmite the fhepherd, and the 
fheep fhall be fcattered," v/as meant only as a ge- 
neral allulion to a fort of proverbial phrafe^ and 
not as a particular application of the prophecy to 
his own crucifixion. The accomplifhment of it, 
therefore, he fuppofes to be yet future, efpecially 
as the preceding and following feclions feem to 
relate to events pofterior to the reftoration of the 
Jews. This latter remark is in a great meafure 
true. Yet, as Dr. Blayney himfelf obferves, in the 
paffage immediately preceding this fedlion, the 
principal fubjedf of the prophecy is broken off, in 
order to relate the means by which God would 
compafs the deliverance of his people, (that is, by 

K 2 a foun- 



132 



a fountain opened for fin and uncleannefs/' mani- 
feftly intending the blood of Chrift, which cleanfeth 
from all fin,) and the blelTed confequences that 
would afterwards enfue. Now what could be 
more in the true fpirit of prophetical compolition, 
than in this place to break forth into the beautiful 
ftrain which follows, if we underftand it as refum- 
ing, with more particularity, the great means of 
grace, the crucifixion, the trials of the followers of 
Chrift, the deftrudlion of the Jews in general, with 
the prefervation of the one third, who, eftablifhing 
the Chriftian church amidft perfecutions, fhould 
become the eledl people of God ? And how much 
more improbable is the interpretation which fup- 
pofes this fedlion to denounce calamities to the 
prince and the people, in the beginning of a future 
w^ar, after the reftoration of the Jews to their coun- 
try ? Jehovah, by the mouth of his prophet Ze- 
chariah, had juft declared, that he would pour 
out upon the houfe of David, and upon the in- 
habitants of Jerufalem, a fpirit of grace and fup- 
plication, and they fhould look towards him, 
whom they pierced in that day too there was to 
be a fountain opened for lin and uncleannefs, 
and idols and falfe prophets were to be no more." 
Can we then, after thefe events, imagine a fudden, 
burft of peculiar animation, almoft amounting to 
triumph, on the fubjedl of a great national fufFer- 
ing, and that too of conliderable duration, as feems 

to 



133 



to be intimated in the expreffions, that " the third 
part fhall be brought through the fire, refined as 
filver is refined, and tried as gold is tried?" On 
the contrary, in the next chapter, after mentioning 
fome future facking of Jerufalem, the prophet im- 
m.ediately adds, then Jehovah lhall go forth 
and fight againfi: thofe nations, as he is wont to 
fight in the day of battle and this agrees with 
the opening of the twelfth chapter, where the dis- 
comfiture and ruin of the nations gathered againfi: 
Jerufalem is the prominent point, and not a pro- 
tradled purification of Ifrael through long afflic- 
tion. What I have here faid is on the fuppofition, 
that the fedlion in quefliion is to be taken in con- 
nection with the predictions which precede and fol- 
low. But I do not know that it can be fhewn not 
to be a feparate and detached prediClion. It is in 
a different fiyle, and more perceptibly lyrical metre. 
Indeed, it is diftinguifhed in Mr. Reeve's new edi- 
tion as a ftrain of metre rifing out of profe. In 
cither cafe, I hope that I have proved it may, with 
the fi:ri6left propriety, be referred to the death of 
Chrift, and the fortunes of his difciples. How 
appofite then was the quotation of our Saviour ! 
How much more did it imply than the abandon- 
ment of him by his Apoftles on that night ! How 
happily did it hint to them where they might read 
their own fubfequent hiftory, and the final prefer- 
vation and fuccefs of the church, which they were 
K 3 to 



134 



to build ! Even if we take it in the moft reftrained 
fenfe of the words, what tendernefs did it fhew in 
him, who was infinite love, that, forefeeing the 
flight of thole around him, he Ihould thus, in a 
manner, previoufiy conible them, by pointing out 
to them, that it was an event long Unce declared in 
the order of God's all-wife difpenfations ! And is 
there any man of tafte who could help being ftruck 
with the comparative inlipidity of the pafTage, 
confidered as a general reference merely to a pro- 
verbial phrafe, efpecially ufhered in, as it is, with ^ 
the form.al introdu6lion, ^' for it is written r" If 
then we apply this predidlion of Zechariah (next 
to Ifaiah, the moft evangelical of the prophets) to 
ihe paffages of the Revelation, where, afte?- its 
converlion, the Rom.an empire is repeatedly de- 
fcribed as a third part^ and frill more, if w^e think 
ourfelves authorized fo to connect them, through 
the reference of Chrill himfelf, on the night of 
his crucifixion, how perfecl is the harmony, which 
we thus trace in the operations of the Holv Spi- 
rit ! 

^7id the fifth a7igel fourided, and I faiv a Jiar fall 
from heaven unto the earth. Rev. ix. i. 

A ^2ir fallen, or which had fallen," in the ori- 
ginal. Mr. Whitaker underftands this of the 
apoftate Jew, Abdia Ben Salem, who is faid to 
have affUted Mohammed in compofing the Ko- 
ran. 



135 



tan. Blfhop Newton tells us, that a meteor is a 
proper type of a falfe prophet. Yet both thefe 
interpreters had remarked on the liar in the laft 
chapter, that it is an ufual emblem of princes and 
great men. The peculiar phrafe of the original, 
a ftar which had fallen," fcems to me very ex- 
adlly to point out Mohammed, who, though de- 
fcended from the princes of Mecca, of the tribe of 
Koreifh, the moft noble of the Arabians, yet was 
left an orphan, with no better patrimony than five 
camels, and one female flave ; whence many 
writers have erroneoufly reprefented him as of 
mean and obfcure parentage. It muft be added, 
that a remarkable comet preceded his birth. 

And to him was given the key of the bottom] efs pit. 

Rev. ix. I . 

The original is, of the well" (or cavern) of the 
bottomlefs pit. This, in Mr. Whitaker's opinion, 
lignifies the cave, to which Mohammed retired for 
meditation, called the cave of Hera. 

And he opened the bottomlefs pit, and there arofe a 
fmoke out of the pit, as the fmoke of a great fur- 
nace ; and the fun and the air were darkened by 
reafon of the fmoke of the pit, lb. 2. 

The fun and the air were darkened, Befides the 
obvious figurative meaning of this pafiage, Bifhop 
Newton fhews, from Abul Farai, (or Abulphara- 
K 4 gius, 



136 



gius, as he is called in Latin,) that in the feven- 
teenth year of Heraclius half the body of the fun 
was eclipfed, and this defedl " continued from the 
former Tifrin to Haziran, (that is, from Odlober to 
June,) fo that only a little of its light appeared." 
This was about five or fix years after Mohammed 
firft preached his dodtrines publicly in Mecca. 
But what is more to the purpofe, it was at the very 
time that he invited foreign princes to embrace 
Mamifm. For having caufed a new lilver feal to 
be made with the infcription, Mohammed the Apo- 
file of God, he fealed with it, and fent public letters 
to the King of Perlia, Kofru Parviz, or Chorroes 
the Second; to the Emperor Heraclius; to the King 
of Ethiopia ; to the revolted governor of Egypt, 
Mokawkas, who called himfelf Prince of the 
Copts ; and to three Arabian chiefs of leading im- 
portance among that people. Now the flory it- 
felf fuppofes this to have taken place fome little 
time, perhaps fome few months, before the death 
of Chorroes, which happened, as Mr. Gibbon in- 
forms us, on the 25th of Feb. 628, early in the 
eighteenth year of Heraclius. Such was the natu- 
ral iign of darknefs in the very inftant when the 
figurative fmoke firfi: iffued beyond the defert of 
Arabia. At the end of the appointed time in 1 64 
Hej. Herbelot fays there was another fupernatural 
darknefs. 

For the explanation of verfes 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 

and 



137 



and 9, Bifliop Newton may be confulted, who haa 
colledted every thing into one point. 

And they had tails like unto fcorpions, and there 
VJere Jiings in their tails : and their power was 
to hurt men five months. Rev. ix. lo. 

Befides feveral ingenious and well-founded ob- 
fervations on the period of five months^ Bifhop 
Newton obferves^, that the greateft con qu efts were 
made by the Saracens between the year 6 1 2, when, 
he fays^ Mohammed firft opened the bottomlefs 
pit^ and 762, when the Caliph Almanfor built 
Bagdad, to fix there the feat of his empire, and 
called it the City of Peace." But, not to men- 
tion that it was many years after 612 before any 
conquefi: was made by the Impoftor or his follow- 
ers, and that fome important achievements were 
performed after 762, it may be fufficient to fay, 
that, according to Newton's own preceding obfer- 
vation, the 150 years (or five months) fhould be 
prophetical, and not folar years, as the learned pre 
late has reckoned them. I fhail therefore take 
another period, much more unexceptionable, only 
premifing, that the prophetical year, being longer 
than the lunar, as it is fhorter than the folar year, 
one hundred and fifty fuch years will be found to 
make one hundred and fifty-two years four 
months and five days of the Mohammedan calen- 
dar. 



138 

dar. Now it was in 633 A. D. or 12 Hej. (though 
Mr. Gibbon erroneoufly fays 63 2,) that Abu Beer 
firft fent his army to invade Syria with the remark- 
able orders, quoted by Bifhop Newton, fo fimilar 
to the former part of the fourth verfe. And, per- 
haps, there are fome circumftances to fhew it ra- 
ther to have been in 634 A. D. or 13 Hej. Count 
then, from either of thefe dates, one hundred and 
fifty-two years four months and five days of the 
Mohammedan computation, and you will arrive at 
the hundred and Jixty -fourth or the hundred and 
fixty -fifth Hejira ; in the former of which years 
the famous Narun al hafchid, by the orders of his 
father, the Caliph al Mohdis, invaded the Grecian 
territories, gained feveral great vidlories, alarmed 
Conftantinople, and, in the hundred and lixty-fifth 
Hejira, granted a peace to the Emprefs Irene, by 
which, among other things, fhe agreed to pay 
a yearly tribute of feventy thoufand pieces of gold. 
This was the greateft triumph ever obtained over 
the Grecian empire by the Saracens, who before 
had always been driven back from Conftantinople 
with lofs and difgrace. From that period the tri- 
bute was fometimes refufed, and fometimes exadled 
by force, war being carried on with various fuccefs ; 
but the caliphs having never after extended their 
dominions at the expence of the Grecian empire, 
after one hundred and fifty prophetical years more 
(Hej. 317.) the Prince of Dair, who was general 

of 



139 



of the Karmatians, plundered Mecca, and the 
power of the caliphs became merely nominal. 

And the four angels were loofed^ which were pre^ 
pared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and 
a year, for to Jlay the third part of men. 

Rev. ix. 15. 

An hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, 
make 391 prophetical years and fifteen days, or 
385 Gregorian years, and 136 dynafties. Alp 
Arflan, under whom were three other dynallies of 
Turks, crojfed the Euphrates, and made a perma- 
nent conqueft of Armenia and Georgia, Roman 
provinces, between the years 1065 and 1068, ac- 
cording to the chronology of Mr. Gibbon. From 
thence count three hundred and eighty-five years 
and an hundred and fifty-fix days, and you will ar- 
rive at the war under Mahomet II. ending with 
the taking of Conftantinople, on the 29th of May, 
1453, Should the pofTeflion of that capital by 
the Turks be for the fame duration, they will be 
driven from it about the firfl of November 1838. 

This, however, is but conjecture as to the fu- 
ture, and not having any direCl foundation in the 
prophecy itfelf. Let us return to another calcula- 
tion of the period, during which the Turkifh 
power was to be in the afcendant. It is in 1299, 
or about that year, that Othman, the founder of 
the Turkifh empire, was proclaimed fultan; and 

foon 



140 



foon after, colledling under his ftandard a mixed 
multitude, the remains of the four fultanies of 
Bagdad, Damafcus, Aleppo, and Iconium, which 
had been for years confined to limits bordering on 
the Euphrates, he, on the 27th of July 1299, 
invaded the territory of Nicomedia, and thence 
rapidly extended his conquefts over the Roman 
dominions. Mr. Gibbon remarks on the fingular 
accuracy with which the Greek hiflorians have 
preferved this date, that " it feems to difclofe fome 
forefight of the rapid and deftrudlive growth of 
the monfter." From that day, July 27, 1299, 
count three hundred and eighty-five years, and 
one hundred and fifty-fix days, and you will come 
to the end of the Chrifiiian sera 1684, which con- 
cluded the fuccefies of the Othmans. They be- 
gan the year 1685 by fending an ambaflador to 
fue for peace, the firji time (obferves Sir P. Ry- 
caut) in their hijiory ; and, the negociation failing, 
they were beaten in every confiderable action with 
great fiaughter. The contemporary hifhoriaii, whom 
I have juft quoted, ufes very remarkable language 
in relating the events of that year. He appears to 
attribute almofi: every thing in this new turn of 
affairs to the vifible interpofition of Providence. 
The period, therefore, from the 27th of July 1 299, 
to the end of December 1684, I take to be the 
true interpretation of the prophecy. 

Bifiiop Newton reckons three hundred and nine- 
ty- one 



141 



ty-one years from the conqueft of Kutahi from the 
Greeks, by Ortogrul^ the father of Othman, in 
1 28 1, to the conquefh of Cameniec from the Poles 
by Mahomet IV. in 1672 ; and, adds he^ forty- 
eight towns and villages in the' territory of Came- 
niec were delivered up" to the fultan upon the 
treaty of peace. But that treaty did not in fadl 
take place before 1676^ and, by the next treaty, 
1698, Cameniec, with Podolia and other territories, 
was reftored to the Poles. The conquefl: of Ku- 
tahi too was not followed up by Ortogrul with any 
other advantage over the Greeks during the reft of 
his life; and Newton counts 391 Gregorian in- 
ftead of prophetical years. 

Atid the angel ivhich I faw Jtand upon the fea and. 
upon the earth lifted up his hand to heaven, and 
/ware by h'lm that Iheth for ever and ever, who 
created heaven, and the things that therein are^ 
and the earth, and the things that therein are^ 
and the fea, and the things vchich are therein, 
that there Jhoidd he time no longer. 

Rev. X. 5, 6. 

Mr. Whitaker has the following remark : It 
is w^ell known that to refcue the holy land out of 
the hands of the Mahometans was the objedl of 
the crufades, the number of which was feveii ; the 
following account of the manner in which the ex- 
hortation of Pope Urban the fecond, to undertake 

the 



142 



the firft crufade, was received at the council of 
Clermont, is taken from Mr. Gibbon. The orator 
was interrupted by the fhout of thoufands, who, 
with one voice and in their ruftic idiom exclaimed 
aloud, God ivills it, God wills it. It is, indeed, the 
will of God, repHed the Pope ; and let this memo- 
rable word, the infpiration furely of the Holy Spi- 
rit, be for ever adopted as your cry of battle, to 
animate the devotion and courage of the cham- 
pions of Chrift. Now to fuch a cry how appofite 
is the angel's anfwer, The time Jhall not he yet 

This application of the crufades was firft the 
fuggeftion of Vitringa. But ingenious as it is, and 
much as I have been at times induced to adopt it^ 
yet, after a good deal of confideration, I cannot ap- 
prove it. Not to mention that there was, what 
hiftorians generally reckon, an eighth crufade, let 
us for a moment only advert to the order of time 
in the vilion, and we fhall fee that the crufades 
cannot v/ell be meant. The aggrandizement of 
the Turks, the inftruments of the fecond woe, dur- 
ing three hundred and ninety-one prophetical years, 
had been already diftindlly predidled, and the fub- 
fequent continuance of their empire for an indefi- 
nite time plainly intimated when the other mighty 
angel comes. He cries with a loud voice, and 
then the feven thunders utter their voices ; but the 
crufades were paft before the fecond war trumpet 
founded, before Othman commenced his career. 

Add 



143 



Add to this, that the feven thunders feem to be li- 
multaneous, and not fucceffive. They are prola-^ 
hly future. And does it not/' as Bifhop New- 
ton fays, " favour rather of vanity and prefump- 
tion, than of wifdom and knowledge, to pretend ta 
conjedlure what they are, when the Holy Spirit 
hath purpofely concealed them ?" 

Mr. Whitaker, in the paffage above cited, ob- 
ferves, how appoUte is the angel's anfwer, thai 
the time Jhall not he yet ;" but, to make the anfwer 
thus appofite, he has recourfe to one of thofe little 
artifices, which have expofed too many commen- 
tators on the Apocalypfe (and with fome juftice) 
to the cenfures of thofe who prefer other interpre- 
tations, and to the ridicule of unbeHevers. For he 
has taken a new tranflation of the text, which 
others had previoufly pointed out, and now flips in 
the emphatic article the^ of which there is no trace 
in any copy of the original Greek. It is true, 
Newton had done the fame, but in whom it was 
only an inaccurate verfion, as he does not make 
any fuch application of it as Mr. Whitaker, and 
he does not fhew, as Mr. Whitaker does by his 
own tranflation, (Commentary, p. i8i.) that he was 
fenfible of the diflerence. In my opinion, the 
words oTt %ooyQ^ ou>c £Tt fc-rat (for fo the befi: MSS. 
read, inftead of ouh so-rai £Ti) are not corredlly re- 
prefented, either in our common tranflation, that 
there Jltould he time no Jongery or in that of Mr. 

Whitaker 



144 



Whi taker and others, that time Jhall not he yet. 
The firft founds Hke a declaration, that here fhould 
be an end of time, and the commencement of eter- 
nity ; or elfe, according to one fenfe of the word 
t'lme^ that a feafon or opporrunit}^ for doing what- 
ever is to be underftood, is now pall. The fecond 
interpretation fuppofes that fome particular feafon 
or opportunity is not yet come, but will come 
hereafter. Now the word xajso? and not xr^'*''^' 
properly lignifies a definite feafon or opportunity, 
and the two words are properly diftinguifhed in 
other paffages of this book. So in the beginning 
and at the end o xat^oj sy-yur, for the time or ap- 
pointed feafon, is at hand ; fo alfo in the very next 
chapter, verfe i8. o x>.t5o?Twv -nv.^^v^ the time, or ap- 
pointed feafon, of the dead to be judged. On the 
other hand, y^^ovQ^ imphes a duration^ an intervaly 
or period of time, generally indefinite, fometimes 
definite. In the former fenfe it is ufed, chapter xi. 

verfe 21. Kat scJ'ajxa «ut'^ y^cTjov Iva ^iroLVOWYi. And I 

gave her /pace to repent. According to which the 
meaning would be diredlly oppofite to Mr. Whi- 
taker's application. But there is alfo a clear error 
in the concluding parts of the tranflation which 
Mr. Whitaker adopts, and more efpecially accord- 
ing to the common ftrudlure of the fentence. It 
certainly lignifies Jhall not he any longe?', inflead of 
Jhall not he yet ; and this is indifputable from the 
firil and fourth verfes of chapter xxi. where the 

fame 



145 



fame phrafe occurs in connedlion with words^ which 
will not by any poffibility admit of any other fenfe 
being given to sn, than longer, or more. 

I underftand then, by the angel's declaration, that 
there lhall be no farther period of time, no ulte- 
rior interval, previous to the reftoration of the Jews, 
which fhall take place, on the fall of the Turkifh 
dominion, (the fecond woe,) juft before the found- 
ing of the feventh trumpet. Let it be obferved at 
what junAure this mighty angel makes his appear- 
ance. The concluiion only of the fecond woe re- 
mained to be told at the moment when he is in- 
troduced. If I may hazard my own opinion, he 
is here ufhered with fo much pomp upon the 
ftage for two purpofes; the one, to mark the fubfe- 
quent conne61:ion of the termination of the fecond, 
and the founding of the third woe trumpet, with 
this place, where, for the firfh time, the chronologi- 
cal order of events under the feals is interrupted ; 
and the other, to give folemnity to the fubje6t of 
the collateral prophecies contained in the little open 
book, as well as to declare explicitly, that what 
follows (at leaft to the fourteenth verfe of the next 
chapter) is a fort of refumption extending, per- 
haps, both ways, beyond the hillory of the people 
jufh before predidled, who are deftined to infiidl 
the fecond woe ; Thou muft prophecy again be- 
fore many people, and nations, and tongues, and 
kings.'* Accordingly, although there is conlider- 

L able 



146 



able difpute as to the exadl ^vifion of the matter, 
yet no rational commentator has ever confounded 
the two books as merely two parts in continua- 
tion. 

A7id there appeared a great wonder in heaven ; a 
woman clothed with the fun^ &c. Rev. xii. i. 

The woman is undoubtedly the primitive Chrif- 
tian Church, The emblems are ingenioufly, hap- 
- pily, and even fublimcly explained by Mede, and 
after him by More and Newton. 

And Jhe being with child cried, travailing in birth , 
and pained to be delivered, lb. 2. 

Mr. Whifton obferves^ that from 33, the year 
of the crucifixion, to 313, the year of Conftan- 
tine's efbablifhment, there is juft the fpace of two 
hundred and eighty years, which number is that of 
the days for the geftation of a woman. But we 
muft reckon by prophetical years, two hundred 
and eighty of which are equal to two hundred and 
fevcnty-fix Gregorian years and eight days. This, 
however, will only corredl the computation by 
teaching us to date from 37, the year when Paul, 
praying in the temple, was fent to the Gentiles, and 
furely this is the true epoch whence to date the 
commencement of the woman's geftation of the 
man- child, who was to rule all nations." 

Bilhop Newton feems to adopt Mr. Whifton's 

obferva- 



147 



obfervation, and yet he has himfelf, in another 
place, rightly ftated the true length of a prophetical 
year, as containing only 360 days. But this is not 
the only inftance where, for the fake of a favourite 
interpretation, the Bifhop has forgotten his own 
rule of computing. See his account of the fixth 
trumpet. 

And there appeared another voonder in heaven ; a7id 
behold a great red dragon^ having /even heads 
and ten horns, and /even crowns upon his head. 

Rev. xii. 3. 

There is no difpute between Catholics and Pro- 
teftants with regard to the red dragon. Conftan- 
tine himfelf, and the writers of his time, applied 
this to his vidlory over Paganifm, in the perfon of 
Maxentius. See Newton's Diflertations, and Eu- 
feb. in vita Conftantini. 

Artemidorus i. 13. and Achmet 283, inform 
us, that a dragon in a dream or vifion lignifies a 
king ; but Plutarch (de fer. numinis vindidla) ufes 
the epithet of dragon-Me, as chara6lerifi:ical of a 
cruel tyrant, in contradiftin<5lion to a mild mo- 
narch, fx y^^vKT-roM j3ao-tX£«f »ypiov xai i^aKovrcii^n ysvo" 

The fymbol is ftill more appropriate to the per^ 
fecuting power of the Roman emperors, becaufe 
the purple or red dragon was the ftandard of fome 
of their horfe ; and as it Ihould feem from the fta- 
L 2 tion 



148 



tion affigned to them, next to the chariot of Con- 
llantius, in the account which Ammianus Marcel- 
linus gives (Ub. xvi. c. lo.) of that prince's tri- 
umphal entry into Rome, and ftill more clearly 
from a paffage relating to Julian, they were a fort 
of life guard attached to the emperor's perfon. 
The dragons ufed by the reft of the cavalry were, 
as our heralds call it, proper. Wolfius fays on this 
paffage, that the dragon was iirft ufed in this 
manner by the Roman army, about the time that 
St. John faw the Revelation. It is to be feen on 
the column of Trajan. See alfo the note in Gro- 
nov. edit, of Amm. Marcell. and Liplius de MiHtia 
Romana. 

Wetftein, however, in his notes, has thrown ftill 
more light on the text. He has fhewn, by various 
references to Jewifh authorities, that their Rabbles 
confidered the angel Samael as the prince and 
guardian of the Romayi people. Now it was Samael 
who, according to fome of their traditions, was the 
tempter of Eve in the Vikenefs of a ferpent. He 
was alfo called the prince of the air ; and was re- 
prefented as the accnfing fpirit, in oppofition to 
Michael, whofe ofhce it is to defend the accufed. 

Michael et Sammael ftmiles funt c-uvrjyo^w et xarr- 
•yoc'^', qui in judicio ftant. Stetit Sammael ad ac- 
cufandum eos ;" an employment which, in the 
fame Jewifh work, (the Rabboth,) is attributed alfo 
to Satan. 

And 



149 



And the woman fled into the wildernefs, where flie 
hath a place prepared of God, that they fliould 
feed her there a thoufand two hundred and three- 
fcore days. Rev. xii. 6. 

The flight of the woman to the wildernefs may 
limply mean, that true primitive Chriftianity re- 
tired to privacy, and fublifted only among indivi- 
duals. Or it may. allude to the original Hermits 
or Eremites, who were perfons of true piety, flying 
from perfecution. 

In the prophetical Hyle 1260 days are noto* 
riouily 1260 years. But the prophetical j^ar con- 
liils only of 360 days. The meafure of the pro- 
phetical year is afcertained by comparing the 
number of days in this verfe with the time, times, 
and half, or three years and a half in verfe 14, and 
the 42 months in chapter xiii. ver e 5. 

Therefore 

1260 prophetical years will be found juft equal to 

1 24 1 Gregorian years, and 333^ days. 
The product of 1:260 multiplied by 360 is 353,600 



3014 



The product of 1241 multiplied by 365 is 352,965 
Add for intercalations 24 flays in every ■ 

common, and 25 days in every fourth 

century, and loj days for the odd 41 

years and 11 months— 3015 days 
Add the 333i days 333i 

253,600 
L3 The 



150 



The year 313 was formerly celebrated as the 
epoch of peace rejiored to the church. See Valelius 
on Eufebius, lib. x. c. 3. Bat it was, perhaps, the 
epoch alfo from which the corruptions of the 
church may be dated, and efpecially when fhe was 
unduly enriched by a plunder of private property : 
for Conftantine ordered all places, where the Chrif- 
tians had formerly aflembled, to be given up to 
them, whether they had been pur chafed by mdivi^ 
duals, or were in the hands of the officers of the im- 
perial exchequer ; and to be given up without com- 
penfation. He alfo gave money to the churches ; 
he exempted the clergy from taxes and public 
offices ; and he confined thefe inftances of his be- 
nevolence to the Catholics^ excluding all fedls. 
See Eufebius, lib. x. c. 2, 3, 5, &c. The perfecu- 
tion of the Donatills may alfo be dated thence. 

The edidl of Milan (the fecond which he ilTued at 
that place, fome little time after he was acknow- 
ledged emperor at Rome) was promulgated early 
in 313, and republifhed by Licinius, on the 13th 
of July, in Nicomedia, where, ten years before, the 
edi(5l of Diocletian, which began the great perfe- 
cution of the Chriftians, had been originally fent 
forth. There were feveral explanatory refcripts of 
Conftantine given fubfequently in the fame year. 
This iaft edidl, exempting the clergy from taxes, 
bears date the 3 ift of October. See Dupin. 

In the beginning of the year 1555 met the fa* 

mous 



151 



mous diet of Augfburgh, which, after long difcuf- 
fions^ finally^ on the i$th of September, fettled what 
is called the peace of religion^ or the religious peace ^ 
confirming all the fecularizations of church proper- 
ty, which had been made by different princes, ftates, 
or cities of the empire, up to that time, and efta- 
bUfhing liberty of confcience, by exempting all the 
Proteftant flates of the empire from the jurifdidlion 
of the Roman Catholic Church. 

I do not know that this exadl period of 1241 
Gregorian years and 333 days between the peace of 
the church reflored in 313, to the peace of religion 
ejiahlijhed in 15555 has ever been obferved by any 
commentator. Have we not here the 1260 days, 
or prophetical years, or 1241 years and 11 months 
according to the Gregorian ftyle, during which pe- 
riod the woman takes refuge in the wildernefs 
Her flight is placed in ver. 6, foon after the birth 
of the man- child, or the triumph of Chriftianity, 

caught up to the throne and in the 13th and 
14th verfes it is diredlly confequent on the fall of 
the dragon, or heathenifm, from power, which is 
immediately and infeparably connected with the 
birth of the man-child. 

And there was war in heaven. Rev. xii. 7. 
It was a notion taught by the Rabbies, that, be- 
fore any ftate was overthrown, or feverely afflidled 
upon earth, the guardian angel or prince of that 
L 4 people 



152 



people was degraded or punillied in heaven. Here 
Michael the protedlor of the holy people, the dif- 
ciples of Chrift, obtains a complete vidlory over 
Satan, the tutelary fpirit of Pagan Rome. 

Wolfius, after Schoetgen, produces a fimilar 
pafTage from the Rabboth. Et projecit Deus 
Sanimaelem et catervam ejus a loco fandlitatis eo- 
rum." 

The acciifer of our hrethren is cajl down, which ac- 
ciifed them hefore our God day and night. 

Rev. xii. lo. 

The word in the bell copies of the original text 
is not xarr/yopoc, but x-arnycop, a word which Mr. 
Mede fhews from Maimonides to have been very 
anciently hebraized from the Greek. To this was 
oppofed that of Paraclit or na^axA?]Toc, the appella- 
tion which St. John alone, of ail the facred writers, 
gives to the Holy Gholl in his Gofpel, and to 
Chrift himfelf in his firft Epiftle. The contrafted 
offices of thefe two charadlers are well expreffed 
by Maimonides, in a paffage which has been al- 
ready quoted, and which from its peculiar applica- 
tion in the prefent inftance I fhali repeat : Para- 
clit dicitur," fays the learned Rabbi, qui inter- 
pellit in bonum pro homine apud regem, cujus 
contrarium eft Kategor, Is enim eft, qui traducit 
hominem apud regem, et conatur occidere eum." 
Is not this introdu6lion of the charadfer of the 

Kategor, 



153 



Kategor^ or Accicfer, here^ with the fame correft 
apphcation of it, as of the Paraclete in St. John's 
other writings, an additional proof that the Reve- 
lation is his genuine produdlion ? 

And the ferpent caji out of his mouth water as a 
flood after the wo7?ian, that he might caufe her 
to he carried away of the flood. And the earth 
helped the woman^ and the earth opened her 
mouthy and [wallowed up the flood which the 
dragon cafl out of his mouth. Rev. xii. 15, 16. 

Thefe verfes are, in my opinion, rightly inter- 
preted by Bifliop Newton to mean the incurfions 
of the barbarous Pagan nations, invited, fome of 
them, by StiUcho and others, who wifhed to reefta- 
blifh Paganifm, but ending in thofe nations being 
fwallowed up, as it were, by the Romans, the van- 
quifhers, adopting the religion, laws, language, and 
manners of the vanquifhed. Mede and More un- 
derftand thefe verfes of the flood of Arianifm, 
fwallowed up by the faithful at the council of 
Nice. Either of thefe interpretations would equally 
interpofe a conliderable interval between the flight 
of the woman and the riling of the beaft in the 
next chapter. 

Bengehus reckons the termination of the 1260 
days at the reformation; but computing them, as 
he does, at 657 common years, he makes the wo- 
man's flight commence in the ninth century. He 

obferves. 



154 



obferves, that the Hebrew word for a dcfert or 
wildernefs is nearly related to that which defcribes 
the wejl. He fuppofes the prophecy to point to 
the evangelical churches in Bohemia. Morland, 
whom Oliver Cromwell fent to Savoy^ applied this 
prophecy to the evangelical churches fo long kept 
up in the vallies of Piedmont. 

And I Jiood upon the /and of the fea, and faw a 
heafl rife up out of thefea, having feven heads and 
ten horns ^ and upon his horns ten crowns ^ and 
upon his heads the name of blafphemy. 

Rev. xiii. i. 

Mede and More prefer this reading; And he 
ftood upon the fand of the fea," that is, the dragon. 
But Bengelius declares for the common reading, 
though there is nearly equal authority for both. He 
decides however (and I think rightly) on the ground 
that there is here a new fubje^t. The efforts of 
the dragon are related in general terms, and then 
an interval of fome duration is paffed over without 
a continued dedu6lion. The fcene is fhifted here, 
as afterwards, in the next chapter, St. John fees the 
lamb fianding on Mount Sion^ and in the feven- 
teenth chapter is carried away into the wildernefs. 

The Proteftant interpreters in general agree fuf- 
ficiently as to the beaft ; Bif^op Newton very well 
explains all the different ciiicumftances in the de- 
fcription. He feems more happy than Mr. Medc 

in 



155 



in his expoHtion of the wounded head, and the 
heahng of the wound. He refers it to the over- 
throw of the imperial power in Auguftulus, and its 
reeftabhfhment in Charlemagne, hy means of the 
Pope. Mr, Mede underfliands this of Conftan- 
tine*s vidlory over Maxentius, or rather, as he ex- 
prefles it, of Michael's victory over the dragon. 
But by that vidlory the head ox form of government 
was not wounded to death. Mr. Gibbon (c. 36.) 
has a palTage which illuftrates this part of the Re- 
velation very flrongly. 

And the heajl which I faw was like unto a leopard. 

Rev. xiii. 2. 

Mr. Whitaker has the following obfervations upon 
the identity of the beaft here defcribed, with that 
which is mentioned in the feventeenth chapter. 

The prophetic hiftory," he fays, of this won- 
derful vilion is now brought down to the fettle- 
ment of the barbarians, which overran the Roman 
empire in its different provinces. After receiving 
the predi6tion of this, under the emblems ex- 
plained above, the Apoftle conceived himfelf to be 
Handing on the fea fhore, when he faw rife out of 
the fea (and by the fea, it fhould be noted, is by 
fcriptural writers often marked the weftern part of 
the compafs) the emblem of a body politic, and 
which is afterwards, in chapter xvii. authoritatively 
explained to be the proper Roman empire, which 

had 



156 



had been overwhelmed with woes and troubles, as 
afcending again to notice and power. In conli- 
dering the charaAeriftics of this power, thofe men- 
tioned in the 17th chapter muft be taken into the 
account with thefe which are enumerated in the 
13th, now immediately before us ; and therefore, 
without further notice, I fhall conlider what is faid 
in either place but as parts of the fame defcription. 
This empire then, under the figure of a fcarlet- co- 
loured wild beaft having feven heads, (explained 
afterwards to be lignificative of feven kings,) was 
declared to have had, in the courfe of its previous 
duration, feven fucceffive forms of government, 
(for fucceffive they are exprefsly marked to have 
been ; and, by having ten horns, authoritatively 
explained alfo of ten co-temporary kings ;) to have 
within the extent of it, after its recovery, ten king- 
doms, whofe fovereigns fhould come into power at 
the fame tim.e with this leading power, fpecifically 
characterized by the beaft, and fhould unite in 
fupporting it with their power and ftrength. While 
the feven forms of government are all characterized 
as blafphemous.'* p. 206. 

This is to affiime, that the beaft in the feven- 
teenth chapter, w^hich is there defcribed as a 
fcarlet-coloured beaft full of names of blafphemy, 
having feven heads and ten horns," is not only the 
fame as in the 13th chapter, but in the very fame 
ftate of his exiftence. But this feems to me very 

queftion- 



157 



queftionable. I do not quite comprehend a fear- 
let-coloured leopard. The bead too in the 13th 
chapter is reprefented as having on his heads the (or 
a) name of hlafphemy ; but that in the 17 th chap- 
ter is himfelf (that is, his body) fidl of 7iames of 
hlafpherny. The former rifes out of the fea, the 
latter out of the ahyfs, or hottomlefs pit. I inchne, 
therefore, to think, that the commentators have 
been too hafty in confounding thefe two defcrip- 
tions. They fhould be kept dillindl. Poffibly 
the beaft of the feventeenth chapter is the true An- 
tichrift, who, as the ancient Fathers thought, is to 
come immediately before the fecond advent of the 
Mefliah ; and limilar alfo is the traditionary belief 
of the Jews and the Mahometans, that a perfon of 
preeminent wickednefs is then to appear. The 
beaft in the thirteenth chapter feems to be living 
under the lixth head, after it was healed from the 
wound ; that is, as many interpreters fuppofe, and 
I believe Mr. Whitaker himfelf, in his former 
little work, agreed, under the revived imperial form 
of government. If fo, there is yet to come another 
head, which is to laft a fhort time. The eighth^ 
we are told, is to be the fcarlet- coloured beaft him- 
felf, and he is alfo to be of the feven\ (whether that 
phrafe means only that he is quietly to fucceed to 
them, or rather that he is to combine all their 
qualities in himfelf ;) and he is to be the laft, he is 
to go into perdition." As he is to afcend out of 

the 



158 

the bottomlefs pit, I fufpedl that there may be in 
that ultimate form of the Roman power fomething 
mingled of more diredl infidelity, than the corrupt 
and idolatrous Chriflianity of papal Rome. A 
conliderable difficulty attends the ufual interpreta- 
tion relative to the feventh and eighth forms of 
government. The fcarlet-coloured heaft is repre- 
fented as d'ljlhicl from either of the feve?!, though 
of (or from) the feven. It feems, therefore, that 
he cannot be the fame with the fixth head, reftored 
to health. Again, the exarch, or the duke, whom 
he appointed, (and of one of thefe the commenta- 
tors underftand the feventh head^) was only an offi- 
cer of the eaftern emperor, in whofe name all their 
authority was exercifed. 

If the eighth form is in any manner to partake of 
the preceding feven, (a character vvhich does not 
apply to the holy Roman empire, as it now exifts,) 
we perceive at once the propriety and beauty of 
the enigmatical defcription, that was arid is not, 
and yet is, or, and Jhall appear \ (c. xvii. 8 ) which- 
ever reading may be preferred. Indeed, the ex- 
planation which I have fuggefted feems the only 
tolerable folution of the cornmon reading. 

The anonymous author of the new Syftem 
of the Apocalypfe, publifhed in 1688, fuppofes 
the Pope himfelf to be the feventh king, dur- 
ins: the ffiort time that he is faid to have exer- 
cifed fole dominion at Rome, from 739 to 798. 

His 



159 



His words are : The Pope became mafter of 
Rome, and temporal lord over it, when Gregory 
the Second excommunicated Leo the emperor. 
Then, faith Sigonius, Rome pafed from the Greeks 
hy reafon of their herefy about mages into the hands 
of the Pope, And for feventy years it remained in 
the farne condition under the popes, that it had 
been formerly under the emperors ; and was the 
fubjedl and flave of thefe new lords." 

Afterwards/' continues he, the fovereignty 
became divided betwixt the Pope and the city of 
Rome. For if the Pope was temporal lord and 
mafter, Rome was alfo lady and miftrefs. And 
this is exa6lly what the angel fays to St. John ; 
and the heaji that was, and is not, even he is the 
eighth king. This bears no difficulty, becaufe, he 
adds, he is of the, /even. For feeing the Pope is 
the feventh head, and the feventh king, and the 
angel fays that the eighth king is of the /even, it 
cannot otherwife be, but that he underftandeth the 
Pope as exerciling his domination after two differ- 
ent manners." 

This feems to me more ingenious and lefs ex- 
ceptionable than the common interpretations, which 
refer the prophecy to the exarchs, or the dukes , 
and he confirms Sigonius by Onuphrius, and 
quotes Vignier for the termination of the Pope's 
fole dominion, by an infurredlion in 798. Yet it 
fhould be remarked, during a great part of this 

time 



lOO 



time there was a temporal fuperior under the title 
of Patrician, which was conferred on Pipin, and 
afterwards on his fon Charlemagne^ before he was 
crowned emperor ; the Greek emperors, likewife, 
always alTerted their right till Irene recognized the 
elevation of Charlemagne to the purple ; and the 
Pope, down to 757, dated his letters and other in- 
ftruments by the years of the emperor, (fee Jortin.) 
Taking, therefore, the whole together, I do not by 
any means think that the lituation of Rome, 
ftripped of all territory, and under no regular go- 
vernment, during that interval, could at all be con- 
lidered as the Roman empire under any of its forms. 
It was the mere capital, or rather one of the capi- 
tals, which had long been abandoned as the feat of 
government, even nominally, and which was now 
exiting in a ftate of anarchical revolt. It was lan- 
guifhing of its wound. I am, therefore, ftill fatif- 
fied that my own conjedlure is worthy of notice. 

And the dragon gave him his power, and his feat, 
and great authority. Rev. xiii. 2. * ■ 

The military guards of the Pope, who attended 
him in the exercife of all his facred fundlions, are 
frequently mentioned in old MS. Roman ceremo- 
nials and rituals, under the name of draconarii. 
This appellation is ufually derived from the figure 
of a dragon on their ftandard, and this was proba- 
bly copied from a fimilar ftandard carried by the 

body 



101 



body guards of the emperors. See Broughton's 
Dictionary of all Religions, art. Draconarii. 

This circumftancey which I have thus noticed, 
I regard rather as the outward mark and fign of 
the accomplifhment, than the accomplifhment it- 
felf of the prophecy. For that I refer to BiHiop 
Newton, and the other moft approved commenta- 
tors, only obferving from them, that the word 
voLfxiv, which we tranflate power, mieans in Hel- 
leniflic Greek, his arinies, 

Lipfius has colle6led (De Militar. Roman.) all 
which he could find relative to the ufe of the dra-^ 
gon, or great ferpent, as the ftandard of the Ro- 
man cavalry ; and the diftindlion of the emperor's 
own ftandard as a purple or red dragon. His I 
think the beil and fulleft account that I know. 

And there was given unto him a mouth fpeahtng 
great things and hlafphemies ; ajid 'power was 
given unto him to continue forty and two months. 

Rev. xiii. 5. 

The period of forty-two months, during which 
the beaft is to have power, is fuppofed by Mr. 
Mede to fynchronize with the time of the wo- 
man's flight into the wildernefs. Yet, in utter in- 
conflftency with this interpretation, he fays, in his^ 
Commentary on the twelfth chapter ; Omnino 
impofiibile eft, ut ilia partus mulieris eredf io, Dra- 
eonis deturbatio, regnique Dei et Chrifti introdu- 



1C2 



6tio, non ad unum et eundem rerum cventum col- 
lineent ; cum ab omnibus, tanquam ab uno quo- 
dam rerum termino, incipiat mulieris fuga in ere- 
mum." He tells us afterwards, indeed, that fhe 
did not immediately on her beginning to efcape 
arrive at the wildernefs, but, after a little delay, 
*^ aliqua temporis mora interjedla." But the adlual 
reign of the beaft did not commence, in the opi- 
nion of any good commentator on the Revelation, 
earlier than 606 at the fooneft, which is little lefs 
than 300 years after the woman, according to Mr. 
Mede, began to fly ; and furely this is too long an 
interval to be called a little delay, in reaching the- 
wildernefs. 

I fhould place the commencement of the beaft's 
a6lual reign much later, with Pi pin's gift of the ex- 
archate in 756, which would bring the termination 
of the 42 prophetical months to the year 1998 ; 
or four years earlier, dating from the depolition of 
Childeric (jufiu papae) and the coronation of Pi- 
pin (audloritate pap^) in 752. 

Bifhop Newton, to make the two periods fyn- 
chronize, fuppofes the inundation of barbarous na- 
tions to have preceded, and to have occafioned the 
flight of the woman. But there Mede is more 
found. The ferpent cafl out the water after the 
woman, oTTKrw auTn?, that is, as fhe was flying. 

And 



163 



And I beheld another heaji coming up out of the 
earth ; aiid he had two horns like a lanib^ and hs 
/pake as a dragon. Rev. xiii. 1 1. 

This two-horned bealt is generally underftood 
to mean the ecclefiaftical authority of the Roman 
church, as diftinguifhed from the political charac- 
ter of the Pope at the head of the Roman empire 
and Chfiftendom ; and in the two horns fome find 
the regular and fecular clergy, and fome the two 
orders of friars, who were the great fupporters of 
.the Pope's fpiritual power. Mr. Mede refers it to 
the pretended double power of binding and loofing, 
and Dr. More adds fome other conjectures. 

The image of the beaft" foriie fuppofe to 
mean the inquifition, and fome the holy Roman em- 
pre in the weji, Bifhop Newton ably refutes both 
thefe explanations, but he is not more happy in 
his own. He confiders the Pope as the image of 
the beaft, although he had juft before reprefented 
the beaft himfelf as the Pope, where he is defcrib- 
ing his blafphemies and exploits. I think the 

image of the beail" is the polity and jurifpru- 
dence of the church, formed exadtiy in the fimili- 
tude of the civil government and laws of imperial 
Rome. Juftinian's code of the civil law is ex- 
prefsly adopted into the canon law, wherever it is 
not varied by the diredl authority of the church, 
Gratian's decree, and the decretals of Gregory^ 
M 1 were 



104 



were drawn up in imitation and emulation of the 
Pandedls. What follows in the fourteenth, fif- 
teenth, lixteenth, and feventeenth verfes, applies 
extremely well to this interpretation. The ftudj' 
of both laws has gone together. Mr. Gibbon, in 
his forty-ninth chapter, calls the decretals " the ma- 
gic pillar of the fpiritual monarchy of the Popes," 
as diftinguifhed from the temporal, of which he 
conliders the forged donation of Conftantine as the 
main fupport, Luther, when he firft broke de- 
cidedly with the Pope, (Leo X.) publicly burned 
the code of the canon law at Wittemberg ; and 
wrote a treatife to fhew the dominion which that 
code eftablifhed in the Pope over all kings. 

And he had power to give life unto the image of the 
heajl^ that the image of the heaji Jhould both 
/peak, and caiife that as many as would not war- 
Jhip the image of the heafl Jhould he killed. 

Rev. xiii. 15. 

Many have been condemned as heretics for de- 
nying the infalhbility of the Roman church, though 
in their dodlrines they did not differ materially 
from her. 



And 



165 



And he caiifed all, both fmall and great, rich and 
poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their 
right hand, or in their foreheads. Rev. xiii. i6. 

He, that is^ the image of the heafi, fays Dr. 
More, marks all as the flaves of the beaft. 

And that no man might buy orfeU,fave he that had 
the mark or the name of the beaft ^ or the number 
of his name. lb. 17. 

Mr. Lowman holds this fecond beaft (the beaft 
with two horns) to be the holy Roman empire 
eftablifhed in Germany. Vitringa regards it as 
the inquilition, with the Dominican and Francif- 
can orders of monks. Boffuet and Grotius be- 
lieve it to be phiJofophy faJfely fo called. Dr. Hart- 
ley, in the conclufton of his Obfervations on Man, 
conftders infidelity as the beaft, meaning the firfi 
beaft. It is the great objedl of Mr- Kett's pabh- 
cation on the prophecies to fhew the fecofid beaft 
to be the infidehty of jacobin France. But the 
common interpretation, to which I have adhered, 
with a flight difference as to the image, feems to 
me much the beft, as being agreeable to the natu- 
ral order of the prophecy, and the clofe conne6lion 
which is every where preferved between the fecond 
and the frji beaft. 

The anonymous author of the Nezv Syftem of 
the Apocalypfe, written in the charadler of a French 
M 3 minifter. 



166 



minifter, (1688,) has the following paflagc upon 
this verfe : " The beafi: with two horns hath three 
forts of fubjedls or followers ; one that bears his 
mark, another that carries his name^ and a third 
that hath the member of his name. The Fope hath 
alfo three forts of adherents ; one that beareth his 
mark^ which is the Eccleftqftics, that are tied to 
him by an oath, and who boaft of an mdeVtbh cha- 
racter. Another that carrieth his name^ which is 
thofe that do flyle themfelves Papifts, and who do 
glory in it, as Bellarmin did. The third fort bear 
the number of his name^ and thefe are they who are 
afhamed to be called Paf 'ifts, and account it for an 
injury to be fo ft y led, as the moft part do in France. 
But they call themfelves Catholics, which is a 
word that hath reference to number, Catholic lig- 
nifying univerfal ; and this caufeth that the Pope 
doth acknowledge them for his." But they are 
more properly called Roman Catholics, and the 
former of the twp words is the diftin6live appella- 
tion. 

The reading adopted by Griefbach, from the 
beft manufcripts, makes but two diftindlions. It 
is fave he that had the mark, the name of the 
beaft, or the number of his name thus making 
the name, or the number of the name, explanatory 
of the mark, and not independent of it. Some 
good manufcripts have ilill a different reading; 

fave he that had the mark of the name of the 

beaft. 



107 



beaft, or the number of the name." On the 
whole, I prefer Griefbach's, in the conftrudlion 
and fenfe which I have given it above. The 
meaning will then be, that no man might buy or 
.fell, but one who acknowledged himfelf a Paplji, 
or at.leaft a Roman Catholic. 

Here is ivifdom. Let him that hath underjianding 
count the number of the heajl : for it is the num- 
ber of a man ; and his number is Six hundred 
three/core and fix. Rev. xiii. 18. 

The name Kxtmoc^ mentioned by Irenaeus^ the 
difciple of Polycarp, who was inftrudled by St. 
John, as anfvvering to the number 666, is well 
known. Jt has alfo been obferved, that Ji>>;Dn, 
Romiith^ or Roman in Hebrew, the feminine adjec- 
tivfe to agree with beaji, kingdom, or feat^ or (which 
I rather prefer, as correfponding with Aarfivo? in 
Greek,) Romanus, will make exactly 666. 

The title Vicarius filii Dei, afTumed by the Popes, 
and faid to be infcribed over the door of the Vati- 
can, gives the fame fatal number ; and it is alfo to 
be found in Bev£(^ixtc?, which is the name in Greek 
charadlers of the Pope who in 685 firft obtained 
firom Conftantine Pogonatus the independency of 
the Roman fee, in an edi6l, that the Pope then 
eledled fhould be ordained without waiting for the 
confirmation of the emperor; an edidl in which 
M 4 Baronius 



168 



Baj'onius and other Catholic writers greatly tri- 
umph. 

Befides thefe, there has been almoft a miracu- 
lous variety of folutiorxS propofed^ meeting all by 
different ways in the fame point. 

Two of the beft in Wolfius (independent of 
thofe generally known) are the nmneral letters in 
TJna Vera CathoLICa InfaLLIhlLIs eCCLesla^ 
(una vera Catholica infallibilis ecclelia) U or V 5 + 
V5 + C loo + L 50 + 1 I + C loo + I I + L 50 + L 50 
4-Ii+Ii+L5o + Ii + Cioo-fCioo + L5o + Ii 
— 666 ; no refearched appellation of the Roman 
church, but that which it peculiarly affects ; and 
alfo in EKKAH2IA ITAAIKA, E 5 + K 20 -fK 20 + A 
30H-H8 + 2 200 + 1 lO + A i-f I io+*T300 + A i+A 
30 -fl lo + K 20 4-A 1=666; but this4atter word 
can only be made exaA by the help of the Doric 
diale6l. 

Archbifhop Newcome obferves, in the notes to 
his tranfiation of the New Teflament, that in the 
Latin arithmetic alone the lim.ple numeral letters 
precifely make up the number 666 ; viz. I i + V 5 
+ X lo + L 50 + C loo + D 500=666, the Mwhich 
we now ufe for iooo-> being merely an error de- 
rived from the ancient mode of expreffing it, by a 
compound figure (D, or two D's joined back to 
back. The fimphcity of this folution pleafes me; 
and the more, becaufe it confifts of fix letters only, 
which Irenaeus thought important. 

As 



169 ■ 

As to Ungle names^ the number is to be found 
alfo in TEITAN, according to Irenaeus, who 
feems to think this word particularly recommended 
by the circumftance, that it has only fix letters. 
He appears to conlider it as bearing a reference to 
the praenomen Tttus^ which belonged to Domi- 
tian^ in whofe reign the Revelation was feen, and 
whom he hints to be no improper type of the An- 
tichrift of latter times. It may have fuch an allu- 
fion, and alfo a myftical meaning, as applying to 
the laft great wicked potentate^ perhaps fome man 
of obfcure origin, fome earth-born giant" of im- 
piety, who may likewife be, in another fenfe of the 
word, the falfe God, or daemon of that emble- 
matical fun," which under the fourth vial (c. xvi. 
ver. 8.) is to fcorch men with fire ; or that in which 
the angel is to take his ftation, (c. xix. 17.) when 
he is to call the fowls of heaven together to eat the 
flefh of kings, of captains, of mighty men, and of 
all men, at the fupper of the great God. This I 
do not propofe as a dire 61 and primary, but as a 
collateral and fecondary application, concurring 
and fubfidiary to the principal. See fome obfer- 
vations of Knittel on this name, as quoted by Mi- 
chaelis, although I do not agree with him in his 
conftru6lion of Irenaeus, relative to the date of the 
Apocalypfe. 

Bengel endeavours to fhew from Irenaeus, that 
the numbers in the ancient Greek text were in the 

neuter 



170 



neuter gender, and in the Latin were in the maf- 
cuUne ; in one cafe srn, and in the other ann't, be- 
ing underftood : though he admits that numbers, 
abftra6ledly taken, ought to be in the neuter gender 
in Greek. Suppofing this to be well founded, 
there are two folutions of the number, which will 
immediately, naturally, and ealily apply. The 
firft is Mr. Fleming's, who fays, " it is very re- 
markable, that in the year 666 Pope Vitalian did 
firft ordain, that all public worfhip fhould be in 
Latin." But I cannot find any fatisfadlory autho- 
rity for this affertion. Platina, it is true, mentions 
Vitalian's regulation of the church fervice, imme- 
diately before the tranfadlions of the year 667. 
That author, however, does not mark years, nor 
ftridlly obferve chronological order. Others date 
thefe adls of Vitalian in 660. But neither does 
that appear to be certain. The librarian may 
feem to throw doubt on the fadl itfelf. He only 
fays, Ille regulam ecclefiafticam atque vigorem, 
ut mos erat, omnimodo ohfervavit,'^ But this paf- 
fage he introduces immediately before the arrival 
of the emperor from Conftantinople in 663. But 
the vulgar 662 would equally anfwer, as being, ac- 
cording to the beft critics, the real 666 ; and either 
the true or the commonly received computation of 
Chrift's birth might, with nearly equal propriety, 
be here intended. Kohlreiffe, (a German author, 
quoted by Wolfius as a man of learning and ta- 
lents,) 



171 



lents,) in his Sacred Chronology, explains it of the 
final fubverfion of the emperor's defign of transfer- 
ring the feat of empire back to Rome, which was 
defeated by Vitahan in 666, and thus left an open- 
ing for laying the foundation of the papal power ; 
and the phrafe, " the number of a man," he fup- 
pofes to mean the vulgar ^era of the incarnation. 
This, however, was an event (if it even be rightly 
dated) which only led indiredlly to the exaltation 
of St. Peter's chair. 

Mr. Lowman, after an hint thrown out by 
Fleming, fuppofes, that 666 years from the date of 
the vifion itfelf will bring us to the rifing of the 
beaft. St. John is believed to have feen the Apo- 
calypfe at Patmos, in the year 96 ; for which fee 
Mills, in the 157th fe(rtion of his Prolegomena. 
It happened on the Lord's day, which fome inter- 
preters, founding themfelves on a palTage of Chr}^- 
foftom, underffcand of Eafter-day, But as 66j5 folar 
years added to 96 would give 762, a period mark- 
ed by no ftriking event, Fleming aflumes it to be 
moft probable, that the true date of the vifion was 
92, and not 96 ; from which reckoning 666 years, 
he comes to 758; in or ahoiit which year, he fays, 
as near as he can trace it. Pi pin made his famous 
donation of territory to Paul the Firfl, and that 
Pope began to build the church of St. Peter and 
St. Paul. But this donation was firft made to 
Pope Stephen the Second, or the Third, as fome 

call 



172 



call him, in the year 755, according to Du Fref- 
noy ; or 756, according to Guthrie, in his Abridg- 
ment of the Univerfal Hiftory. So that the addi- 
tion of 666 folar years to the affiimed date of 9a 
will not anfwer. Let us then try 666 prophetical 
years, which are equal only to 656 folar years five 
months and 18 days. Now this period, from 
Eafher-day A. D. 96, would bring us to the au- 
tumn of the year 752, about which time Pope 
Stephen (who at his ele6lion in the preceding 
fpring had been the firfh Pope carried on men's 
fhoulders, according to the cerem.ony of elevating 
temporal, princes) firfl: exercifed the authority of 
the Roman fee, in depoling one king of France, 
and nominating another. That the depofition of 
Childeric, the laft of the Merovingian race, was 
pronounced by the command of Pope Stephen, 
(julfu Stephani R. Pont.) we have the exprefs tefti- 
mony of Eginhard, the learned fecretary of Charle- 
magne, who alfo fays, that Pipin was conftituted 
king, from mayor of the palace, by the authority 
of the Roman Pontiff, per au6loritatem R. Pont, 
ex Prsefedfo Palatii Rex conflitutus." Some French 
hiflorians, jealous of the independence of their 
crown, have referred all to the afTembly of the 
ilates, which met this year at SoifTons. They 
obferve, that the fi:rong phrafes ufcd by Eginhard 
are fufceptible of a very foft interpretation. Be 
it fo," anfwers Mr. Gibbon ; yet Eginhard un- 

derilood 



173 



derllood the worlds the court, and the Latin lan- 
guage." His words too exadlly agree with thofe 
of fome of the contemporary annahfts. But the 
date of this tranfadtion is not quite fo clear. The 
annalift who feems to have lived neareft to the 
time, as his work ends with the year 790, fays, 
under the year feven hundred ^Xi& fifty -one ^ " Pipi- 
mis rex elevatus. Stephanus Papa eledlus." But 
it is certain, that Stephen was not Pope till the 
26th of March, 752. The next annalift, who fi- 
nifhes his labours with the century, fays under the 
year feven hundred fifty -two, Dominus Pipi- 
nus elevatus eft in regem in Sueffionis civitate.'* 
But the anonymous annals, which reach down tQ 
eight hundred and fourteen y reprefent that Pope Za- 
chary in 749, by his apoftolical authority, ordered 
Pipin to be made king; that he was eledled accord- 
ingly, and anointed by Pope Boniface in 750; that 
Pope Stephen came to France in 7 53, and in 7 54 
confirmed Pipin king with the holy un6lion, and 
anointed alfo his two fons, Charles and Carloman. 
This account feems to be followed by Mr. Gib- 
bon, but I have no doubt that it is erroneous ; for 
it appears to me to be diftindtly contradidled by 
Eginhard, our beft and fureft guide in the hiftory 
of thefe times. He tells us, that Pipin died after a 
reign of fifteen years and more. Now there is no 
difpute that he died on the 23d of September, 
768, from which if we reckon backwards fifteen 

years 



174 



years and more, we fhall come to 753, or even ttic 
latter end of 752. Mr. Gibbon remarks^ that 
" the mutual obligations of the Popes and the 
Cariovingian family form the important link of 
ancient and modern, of civil and ecclefiaftical hif- 
tory and at the head of thefe he puts, as the 
moft eflential gifts of the former to the latter, firft, 
the dignity of King of France, and, fecondly, that 
of Patrician of Rome. In concluding the firft of 
thefe topics, he fays, that in their boldeft enter- 
prizes they (the' Popes) infifted with confidence on 
this fignal and fuccefsful a6l of temporal jurifdic- 
tion." This was the great and original precedent 
of all their fubfequent ufurpations. Does not then 
the hiftorian here point out, almoll as plainly as a 
&vtSi commentator on the Apocalypfe could, the 
rifmg of the beaft, or, in other words, the origin of 
the prefent holy Roman empire, under the joint 
fovereignty of the Popes, and the fucceflbrs of 
Charlemagne ; one fupreme in fpirituals, and the 
other in temporals } 

The anonymous author of the new fyftem Gon- 
fiders, after Potter, the number of the name, and 
the number of the beaft, to be different things ; 
though 666 anfwers to each. The number of the 
name he explains in the ufual way by the letters in 
AaTfivof, and the Latin numerals in Ludovicus, 
But the number of the beaft, it is obferved, is not 
to be reckoned, but calculated and computed. Now 

Potter 



175 



Potter juftly remarks, that only one number is 
given, which excludes addition, fubtradlion, mul- 
tiplication, divilion, and every other operation of 
arithmetic, except the extradlion of the cube root. 
And the author of the new fyftem (I am not cer- 
tain whether after Potter or not) takes notice, that, 
with regard to the followers of the Lamb, one hun- 
dred and forty-four thoufand, formed of twelve 
thoufand chofen out of each of the twelve tribes, 
the Holy Spirit himfelf has clearly pointed to this 
operation ; and that in the prevalence of the cube 
root twelve^ throughout the new Jerufalem, the 
circumference of which is one hundred and forty- 
four furlongs, the fame is to be found. He argues, 
therefore, that by a limilar procefs we may difco- 
ver the number which- chara6lerizes the beafh. 
Thus the cube root of 666 is 25, leaving a fra6i:ion 
of 41. But the number 25 remarkably abounds 
and predominates in Rome, . and the Romifh 
church. The circumference is faid to be 25 fur- 
longs. It had 25 gates. It had alfo 25 parifhes, 
the 25 priefts of which were the original cardinals, 
who conftituted the privy council of the Popes. 
The great altar at St. Peter's is reprefented to be 
25 feet fquare, to have a crofs upon it 25 hands 
high, and to have on it the five wounds of Chrift 
in five places, making altogether 25. The laft 
general council, which finally fettled their creed, 
the council of Trent, began with 25 bifhops, fi- 

nifhed 



170 



nifhed its work in 25 feffions, fetting forth 23 ar- 
ticles of faith, and concluded its proceedings with 
the'lignature of 25 archbifhops. Laftly too, the 
Popes formerly held their grand jubilees every five 
and tv:e7ify years. For fome of the principal of 
thefe fadts he quotes Baronius and Onuphrius. 

On looking further, I have afcertained what pre- 
cedes to be wholly Mr. Potter's, who, in a letter to 
Dr. Twiffc, (Mede's Works, p. 836.) adds, that 
the number 25, which is fo confpicuous and re- 
markable in the Roman calendar, is alfo a thing 
remarkable and appolite, and a thing which I did 
obferve in a great Roman calendar in the library 
at Oxford, but did not then underlland the reafon 
of it, nor had time at that inftant to fearch the 
reafon, why that number ^as written in great nd 
capital figures r This is probably explained in a 
letter of Mr. Mede to Mr. Hartlib, (ib. p. 880.) 
a little prior in date to Mr. Potter's letter. It is 
in anfwer to an obfervation of a mathematical 
friend of Mr. Hartlib in the Roman calendar, 

that of all the numbers of the epadl they fhould 
choofe 25 for the number of the equation with the 
golden number." " I like it," fays Mr. Mede, 
*^ and think it (as far as I underftand it) worthy to 
be added to the reft of Mr. Potter's of that kind." 
But as I underftand it, the ufe which is made of 
the number 25, in connedlion with the golden 
number of the Chriftian Julian calendar, for find- 
ing 



177 



ing the Gregorian epadl, depends upon the divi- 
lion of the day into 25 parts, inftead of 24, by 
\vhich the anticipation of the moons in a JuHan 
century is reckoned to be parts of a day earher 
than the Nicene fathers had calculated^ when they 
fettled the feafts according to their lunar cycle ; 
and confequently^ as the Gregorian century is 
during three years out of five one day Ihorter than 
the Julian, the moons are H parts too late by the 
new Roman llyle. If this calculation were exadt, 
the choice of the number 25 would be obvious, 
and almofi: inevitable, without a ftudied fubterfuge 
to efcape it. But it is not. If both the numera- 
tor and denominator had been doubled or trebled, 
the real proportions might have been more cor- 
rectly reprefented. 

Mr. Daubuz rejedls the whole of Mr. Potter's 
fcheme, though Mr. Mede admired it as highly 
fatisfadory, notwithftanding he at firft could hardly 
be induced to look at it, from a prejudice, which 
he confeffes himfelf to have received, againft fuch 
calculations of the beaft's number. But Mr. 
Daubuz is influenced by his own hypothelis, that 
the two horns of the fecond beafh are the Patriarch 
of Conftantinople, as well as the Bifhop of Rome ; 
and therefore, as this number of 25 does not ap- 
pear to fuit the Greek church, as well as the Ro- 
man, he thinks it cannot be applied to explain the 
number 666, which belongs to the two-hornedy 

N- and 



178 



and not the ten-horned, beaft. But others may 
invert the argument, and fo rejcdl his hypothelis, 
juft as fairly. 

There is, however, one additional folution, which 
Mr. Daubuz has propofed, or rather noticed, as a 
lingular coincidence, which fhould have been 
added above to the other explanations by ^ Gema- 
trta. The name which the Holy Spirit gives to 
the woman on the fcarlet beaft is Myjlery^ Babylon 
the Great, &c. And the word myjiery is faid to 
have been formerly infcribed on the Pope's tiara. 
But the Hebrew word which lignifies myjiery is 
"IIJID, Sthur^ and the four letters of this word make 
the number of 666, D 60 n 400 •) 6 -) 200 = 666. 

* K*"iIDDU Gematria (vox ell Graeca ysaj/xETpia ipfo fatentc 
Elia, fed ad latiorem ufum extenfa) quam arithmantiam vocat 
Cornelius Agrippa. Eft autem Gematria pars Kabbaliftica, 
qua diverfae didtiones eundem numerum Uteris luis exprimunt, 
fic ut una per alteram fecreto mode explicetur. Exempli gra- 
tia, Nam ecce ego addu6lurus fum fervum meum nD)£ Tze- 
mach." Zach. iii. 8. Quid aut quis, Tzemacb ? nD2f valet 
138, totidem valet 01130 Menaclem Confolator. Hoc autem 
nomen Menachem numeratur a Kabbaliftis ^t Talmudicis inter 
nomina MeJJlce (vid. Lex. Buxt. in Rad. p) unde Kabbaliftice 
per Tzemacb intelligitur illic Mejftas. Hinc paraphraftes Chal- 
daeus tranftulit etiam «rr**ii>D Mejfias. Vide Aben Efram in 
hunc locum. Ita etiam literse vocum rh^W " veniet SbiloF' 
Gen. xlix. 10. valent 358, totidem valet vocabulum n^WO. 
Unde Donee venerit Sb'ilob" perinde eft, ac fi dixiffet, *' Do- 
nee venerit MeJJias^' quomodo Chaldaeus paraphraftes tranftu- 
lit. Hottingeri Thefaurus Philologicus, p. 452, 

And 



179 



And I looked, and, lo^ a Lartih flood on the mount 
Sion, and with him an hundred forty and four 
thoufand, having his Father s name written in 
their foreheads. Rev. xiv. i. 

The fcene is here again changed^ and another 
view of nearly the fame period of time^ as in the 
laft chapter^ is here pointed out to us. There we 
are told^ that the beaft fhould make war and over- 
come the faints ; but that he, who killeth with the 
fword, muft be killed with the fword ; for which 
time the faints fhould wait (as I underftand the 
tenth verfe of the laft chapter) with patience and 
faith. Now we are made acquainted, in a manner 
to encourage and animate all who may be engaged 
in fimilar contefts, with the efforts of the faints, 
during the interval that was to exercife their pa- 
tience. The Lamb is fhewn to us ftanding o7i 
mount Sion, and furrounded with a glorious train 
of thofe, who are the firft fruits to God and Chrift, 
while a new Jong, which they only of human race 
can underftand, is fung to the found of heavenly 
harps. Three different angels, one after another, 
then make folemn proclamations ; the firft, againft 
all worfhip, but of God agreeably to the Gofpel ; 
the fecond, againft Babylon, or the city of Rome ; 
and the third, againft the adherents of the Papacy. 
But here is ftill the patience of the faints. They 
are not yet to be fuccefsful. They are not yet to 
N 2 have 



180 



have reft from their labours and afRidlions. The 
feafon is not yet come for the Son of man to reap 
the earth. That happy epochs ufhered in by a 
new voice from heaven^ is the fubjedl of another 
vilion which fucceeds, exhibiting, not the lamb on 
mount Sion triumphing over his enemies or pro- 
tedling his faints, but one like the Son of man, 
crowned with a golden crown, and fitting on a 
white cloud, who reaps the earth ; and in due fea- 
fon after this harveft follows the vintage, and the 
wine prefs of the wrath of God. 

And I Jaw another angel fly in the midfi of heaven^ 
having the e-verlafling Gofpel to preach unto them 
that dwell on the earth. Rev. xiv. 6. 

I agree with Mede, Daubuz, Newton, and 
others, in underftanding this of the capitularies of 
Charlemagne and Louis the pious, enjoining the 
reading of the canonical Scriptures, as the fole rule 
of faith, without any regard to human traditions or 
apocryphal writings, and forbidding private mafTes, 
pilgrimages, and other fuch fuperftitions. Claud. 
Bifhop of Turin, patronized by thefe princes, was 
a powerful inftrument in the hand of Providence 
for the good work of planting the foundefh princi- 
ples of religion in his churches of Piedmont, which 
never loft the pure do(5lrines of the Gofpel. Al- 
cuin, the preceptor of Charlemagne, edited a cor- 
redled copy of the Old and New Teftament; and 

the 



181 



the emperor, in a preface to a colledion of homi*- 
lies made by Paul the deacon, attributes either 
that edition of the Bible, or fome other, to him- 
felf. 

jind I heard a voice from heaven faying unto nie^ 
Write^ Blejfed are the dead which die in the 
Lord from henceforth : Yea, faith the Spirit, that 
ihey may reft from their labours ; and their works 
do follow them. Rev. xiv. 1 3 . 

The beft authorities omit pot, unto nie. This 
omifEon agrees wonderfully with Newton's expla- 
nation, though he does not feem to have known 
this. It fo becomes a general direAion, applica- 
ble to the reformation. Yet it muft be confeiTed, 
that where a fimilar phrafe occurs in c. x. 4. the 
word pot, unto me, is alfo wanting in the beft ma- 
nufcripts, though what immediately follows is 
clearly addrefled to John in that inftance. At 
any rate, the prefent paffage may ftill apply to the 
reformation, though not in fo lively a manner as if 
the precept, " to write," could be fairly underftood 
to be a general diredlion intended for the period to 
which the prophecy alludes, and not addreffed to 
John. 

The next claufe in this verfe I underftand very 
differently from any commentator, that I have yet 
feen. The conjundlion tva is ufually conlidered 
:as, expreffing the effe6i of the bleflednefs of their 
N 3 deaths, 



182 



deaths, " that they may reft from their lahoursT 
But it feems pecuhar almoft to John to ufe this 
conjunction in expreffing time. Hoogeveen gives 
three examples, all from St. John's Gofpel, c. xii. 
23. xvi. 2. 32. Parkhurft adds c. xiii. i. and alfo 
cites Anacreon, Ode li, v. penult. Stock alfo re- 
fers to I Ep. John iv. 17. and to 3 Ep. John ver. 4. 
And, by the way, does not this ufe of Iva ftrongly 
prove the Gofpel, Epiftles, and Revelation, to be 
all from one and the fame author ? The word ttovwv 
too, which is tranfiated labours, means affli6imis or 
trouhles in this author ; and in chapter xvi. 11. the 
fam.e word is rendered pains. Adopting, therefore, 
the punctuation, which is fuggefted in the margin, 
and is fupported by the beft manufcripts, I would 
tranflate the whole pafTage thus ; from henceforth ^ 
faith the Spirit, yea^ when they fhall have reft from 
their affii6fions. Or the fenfe will be the fame, if 
we adhere to the prefent pundluation. I prefer 
the phrafe have reft, to reft, which is more literal, 
becaufe the latter word may miflead, as it is fo fa- 
miliarly applied in our language to the ftate after 
death. 

This proclamation, with the folemn manner of 
the Spirit, then, I take to refer to the epoch of 
liberty of confcience being eftabhfhed, in contra- 
diftindlion to the proclamation, with which the 
laft vilion clofed in the foregoing verfe, intimating 
that up to that time the fufFerings of the faints 

had 



183 



had not ceafed. Great as is the glory of martyr- 
dom, furely that time may well be called bleffed 
of God^ when he fpares his people fuch trials. 

The mifunderftanding of the paffage may have 
arifen much from the word vey.coi, the dead, the 
meaning of which is fufficiently plain in the Greek 
from the participle^ which follows in the prefent, 
or imperfedl, tenfe^ aTc5-vrc-xcvT£?, and not in the 
paft, aTTOTtS-vyiJcoTf? ; but in our tranflation, ^.vhich die 
is an expreffion more ambiguous. 

Mr. Mede, on fecond thoughts^ was convinced 
that this verfe belongs to what follows, not to what 
preceded. And I am fatisiied. that it introduces a 
new vilion. 

And I looked, and behold a irhite cloud, arid upon 
the cloud one fat like unto the Son of ??ian, having 
on his head a golden cronn, and in his lumd a 
fharp fickle. Rev. xiv. 14. 

This, I think, refers to the confequence of the re- 
formation, the felecfing of fome for prefervation, 
and others for deftru6iion. So Chrift himfelf ex- 
plains his parable of the tares and the wheat, at 
harvefl time, Matt. xiii. And this is the harveft 
of the Son of man. Bifhop Newton underftands 
this as of a judgment of God in anger ; as well as 
the vintage which follows. Both, he fays, are co- 
pied from Joel iii. 13. But furely this language 
ii very improper. St. John relates the vifions 
Y{ 4 '■j:hich 



184 



which he Jaw, and the heavenly proclamations 
which he heard^ in the Spirit. Thefe are not me- 
taphors copied from another. His own defcriptions 
of what he faw^ or heard, may be borrowed from 
the figures and expreffions of the old prophets^ but 
the fymbols and voices are not copied by him. 
That notice would at once make the whole a fic- 
tion. Bifhop Newton, from inadvertence, has too 
often fallen into this inaccuracy of language. . So 
-before, in the anfwer of the Spirit ver. 13. he finds 
an illufiouj as he calls it, ta Ifaiah Ivii. i, 2. 

This harvefh, as I have obferved, feems prima- 
rily to typify the feparation of the reformed from 
the Papal church in the preaching of Luther, 
Zwingle, and others. It may alfo further allude to 
the propagation of Chrifiiianity, more or lefs pure, 
in the difiant quarters of the globe^ about the time 
of the reformation. 

The bloody wine-prefs, in the 20th verfe, I ap- 
ply primarily to the fanguinary wars in Italy, and 
veiy much in the ecclejiqftical Jfate, defcribed (ver. 
20,) by the fpace of 1600 furlongs, fo well elucidated 
by Mr. Mede. Thefe wars, the re verfe of the blood- 
lefs mock-encounters by which the princes of 
Italy, with their Condottieri, had been accuffcomed 
to fettle their ow^n difputes, began towards the 
clofe of Leo the Tenth's pontificate, from the rival 
pretenfions of Charles the Fifth and Francis the 
Fiiii:, whofe quarrel in Italy neceffarily involved the" 

Pope 



185 



Pope for his own fafety. See Robertfon's Charles 
V. vol. i. The German Proteftants were confpi- 
cuous in thefe wars. They formed the flrength of 
the Conftable Bourbon's army. 

Thefe interpretations of the harveft, and the 
'vintage J will be found admirably to continue the 
chain of the prophecy. Bifhop Newton^ whofe 
great excellence is his clofe adherence to the order 
of time, and fiicceffion of hiftorical events^ has 
made a great chafm here, by coniidering both the 
harvejl and vintage^ and all that follows, as future. 
Yet I do not mean to exclude a fecondary applica- 
tion in a great meafure future. The harveft may 
fignify that feparation, which is continued under 
the -firft three vials at leaft, to the advancement of 
the reformed, and the lofs of the Papifts ; and the 
wine-prefs may yet receive a farther accomplifh- 
ment at Armageddon. 

And I faw another fign in heaven^ great and mar- 
vellous, /even angels having the fe^en laji 
plagues \ for in them is filled up the wrath of 
God, Rev. XV. i. 

What follows is introduced here as another fign 
or fymbol ; by which, I apprehend, it is intimated, 
that the fequel is not a mere continuation of the 
fame uninterrupted prophecy ; but a fuller re- 
fumption of fome collateral events, touched before, 
as in the la& verfes of the laft chapter, the con- 

ne<Si:ion 



186 



nedlion of which with the victory of Chrill: under 
the feventh vial, feems to be diredlly pointed out 
in the fifteenth verfe of the nineteenth chapter. 

The beft interpreters, fays Bifhop Newton, 
*^ have failed and floundered more in this part, 
than in any other." However, all Proteflants 
agree that thefe vials fignify the different flages in 
the decline and ruin of the papacy, connedled 
under the fixth vial with the deftrudlion of the 
Ottoman empire, or the reftoration of the Jews. 
Mr. Mede fuppofes the firft vial to refer to the 
preaching of the Waldenfes, Albigenfes, and Lol- 
lards ; the fecond, to the reformation of Luther ; 
the third, to the completion of our own reforma- 
tion in the reign of Elizabeth ; the fourth, to 
Guflavus Adolphus the reft of courfe were then 
future. Dr. More is very general. Mr. Lowman 
dates the pouring out of the firft vial in 830 ; of 
the fecond in 1099, period of the firfl crufade ; 
of the third in 1225, when the inquifition was 
eredled againft the Albigenfes ; of the fourth in 
1 5 1 9, when the fweating ficknefs prevailed in Eng- 
land. The refl he confiders as future, as he alfo 
thinks the harvefl in the lafl chapter to be. Bi- 
fhop Newton believed all the vials to be future, 
for which he gives reafons by no means fatisfadlory 
to my judgment. Mr. Fleming has taken a 
middle courfe, beginning from the reformation ; 
and one of his profpe6live interpretations, (that of 

the 



187 



the fourth and fifth vials,) which he modeftly calls 
a conjedlure, has, in our days, received fuch a con- 
firmation, as to entitle him to our higheft atten- 
tion. Yet in fome points I differ from him. 

He lays it down as a principle of his interpreta- 
tion, that the vials which are included in the 
feventh trumpet fuppofe 2l Jiruggle and war be- 
tween the popifh and reformed parties, and that 
every vial is to be looked upon as the event and 
conclufion of fome new periodical attack of that 
firft party upon this other, the iffue of which 
proves at length favourable to the latter againffc 
the former, which, feeing it is the moft noble and 
remarkable part of the period that, the vial relates 
to, is, therefore, that which denominates the period 
itfelf." 

That thefe plagues (or blows, as the word lite- 
rally fignifies) are all to be received in wars, I 
agree ; and that they are to be infli(5ted by the re- 
formed church I underfland from the feven angels, 
who pour out the vials, being dreffed in the habit 
of the priejts of the temple of God. But I do not 
think that each vial is the event and conclufion of 
a periodical attack from the Papifi:s. The fixth 
and feventh vials, as Mr. Fleming himfelf re- 
marks, run into each other ; and I think it can be 
fhewn, that the operation of each vial, when it has 
been poured out, continues unexhaufi:ed, though 
adling with diminifhed power, to the end ; but 

each 



188 



each is defignated by the moft immediate and 
flriking efFedl of its influence, which adds fomc 
new blow to the kingdom of the beaft. I beheve, 
too^ that the principal events and prominent 
epochs, which charadlerize the different vials, and 
prepare the ruin of the Papal Roman empire, will 
be found to tally very aftonilhingly with the firft 
preparatory fteps to the eftablilhment of the Pope's 
authority, there being the exadl interval of 1 260 
prophetical years between one and the other. If this 
can be fliewn, it will ftrongly, and I think irrefifti- 
bly, confirm the truth of the interpretation. It 
will be an additional tefb, if the emblems employed 
fliall be found to be connedled with any thing of a 
literal accomplifhment. 

And they ftng the Jong of Mofes the fervant of God, ' 
and the fong of the Lamh. Rev. xv. 3. 

The fong, being the fong hoth of Mofes and the 
Lamh, appears to me to intimate, that in thefe 
vials is contained the united triumph both of the 
Jewifh and Chrifhian difpenfations. 

And after that Hooked^ and, hehold, the temple of 
the tabernacle of the teft'imony in heaven was 
opened. lb. 5. 

The opening of the temple of the tabernacle of 
the teflimony, which is mentioned in this place, 
may be probably dcligned to inform us, that the 

train 



189 



train of vilions, on which we now enter, is meant 
to condudl us to the third woe ; as on the found- 
ing of the feventh trumpet (c. xi. 19.) the temple 
of God was faid to have been opened, and the ark 
of his teftament to have been difcovered. The 
fame circumftance, being repeated here, may be 
only inferted to fhew the coincidence of the two 
paffages, after the introductory hiftory of the for- 
tunes of the church, and the weftern empire under 
the Pope, as its political head in fpirituals. But 
thefe events are hinted to be prior to the founding 
of the feventh trumpet, by the temple being here 
filled with fmoke, till all the plagues are fulfilled ; 
then the ark is difcovered. 

And the firft wejit^ and poured out his vial upon the 
earth ; and there fell a noijome and grievous fore 
upon the men which had the mark of the' heaji^ 
and upon them which worjhipped his image. 

Rev. xvi. 2, 

The firfl viah 
This vial is poured out upon the earth, and is 
attended by a noifome and grievous fore or ulcer, 
falHng upon thofe who had the mark of the beaft, 
or worfhipped his image. . Fleming underfiands 
this to mean the Popifh clergy, and the papal 
dominions and revenues, as upheld by them." 
He fuppofes the vial to commence with the re- 
formation, and to end about 1566. I fhould ra- 

thei; 



190 

ther apply it more llridlly to the firft great blow 
which the papacy received from the incurable ulcer 
in the landed revenues of the churchy in confe- 
quence of the firft wars with the Proteftants, which 
were terminated by the peace of religion made in 
1555? and ratified in 1556. Thefe wars, chiefly 
carried on in the interior of Germany, were on 
both fides fupported at the expence of the papacy. 
On one fide the event withdrew a great part of 
Germany from the ecclefiaftical dominion of the 
Pope, and, in the mean time, Sweden, Denmark, 
and England, had alfo embraced the dodlrines and 
difcipline of the reformers. On the other fide, 
not to mention the great ftrain that every arma- 
ment was to the Roman revenues, already much 
exhauffced by Julius II. the Pope gave to the Em- 
peror in 1546, for the year's war againfl: the Pro- 
teftants, half the rents of the church-lands in 
Spain, and liberty to alienate the revenues of the 
monafiieries to the amount of five hundred thou- 
fand crowns. The public debt of Rome has been 
ever fince increafing, and the refources of that go- 
vernment as regularly decreafing, while the decay 
of the Catholic church eftablifhment has every 
where kept pace. During the whole period from 
the reformation to the peace of religion, the plague 
made frequent ravages, efpecially in Italy. In 
1522, Pope Adrian, on his arrival at Rome, found 
not only the territorial revenues exhaufted, and 

the 



191 



the whole fyfbem of finance in the greateft confu- 
lion, but the plague alfo beginning ; which was 
confidered by popular fuperftition as a bad omen. 
It continued its ravages for two years, and de- 
ftroyed immenfe numbers. The army of Bour- 
bon, in 1527, is faid to have fufFered much from 
it in Rome ; and in 1528, the fame army, belieg- 
ing Naples under Lautrech, was greatly reduced by 
it. The next year, the weaknefs of the French 
garrifon at Genoa, from the fame caufe, afforded 
Doria the opportunity of reftoring liberty to his 
country. At a later period, in 1546^ the plague 
breaking out at Trent, caufed the famous council 
to be adjourned to Bologna. Add to this, that 
not more than twenty years before the reformation 
a new /pedes of plague appeared in Italy, and was 
from thence fpread over Europe by the French, 
from whom the difeafe acquired a name, though 
they called it the Neapolitan malady. The opera- 
tion of this vial may have tacitly continued till 
1566, or longer, but the war ended with the pro- 
minent epoch of the peace of religion in 1555 
and 1556, juft J 260 prophetical years (as already 
has been remarked, c. xii. 6. p. 149.) from the firft 
ftep towards the eftablifhment of the Papal power 
in 313 and 314. A difadvantageous peace is the 
great blow of an unfuccefsful war. 



And 



192 



jirid the fecond angel poured out his vial upoji the 
Jea ; and it became as the blood of a dead rnan : 
and every living foul died in the fea. 

Rev. xvi. 3. 

The fecond vial. 
This vial is poured out upon the fea^ which be- 
comes in confequcnce like the blood of a dead 
man. This foretells the maritime afcendancy of 
the Proteflant ftates, and the eonfequent defeats 
and loffes of the Catholic power by fea. Fleming 
makes this period commence with the year 1 566, 
(whence he dates the w^ars between the King of 
Spain and the Flemifh provinces,) and end about 
1617. And I agree to reckon the pouring out of 
this vial from thefe wars, which afFedled the mari- 
time 'part of the circle of Burgundy, the principal 
fea coaft of the empire. But I do not find any ma^ 
ritime hoftiiity of confequence till the year 1 5 7 i > 
when the Zealanders took the Brill, which event is 
generally allowed firft to have given a turn to 
affairs in favour of the States General. The year 
1572 was lignalized by the firfl great vi6lory of 
the Zealanders by fea over the Duke of Medina 
Celi ; and this was jufl 1260 prophetical years 
from the dedication of Conftantinople in 330, an 
event, which, after the peace of the church, and 
the preeminence then naturally affigned to the 
Bifhop of Rome^ was the next that materially 

tended 



193 



tended to increafe the influence of the papacy, by 
removing the prefence of the emperor and the 
fplendor of the eftabhfhed churchy by the apph- 
cation of the revenues of the heathen temples to 
adorn that city. 

But the great blow to the naval power of Spain, 
then the principal fupport of the Pope, and mif- 
trefs of the principal maritime provinces of the 
empire, and in an expedition profefledly under- 
taken for the Catholic caufe, (though more truly 
in refentment of the aid afforded by Queen Eliza- 
beth to the Dutch,) was given by the defbrudlion 
of the famous armada in Augufl: and September 
1588. And this was precifely a period of 1260 
prophetical years from the celebrated council of 
Sardica, which (as Mofheim notices, though he 
endeavours to lefTen the importance of what palTed 
there) is confidered by Catholics as a corner-ftone 
of the papal power. That council gave a right of 
appeal to the Pope in the cafe of a bifhop being 
depofed by his brethren ; and the corrupt favour 
fhewn at Rome to all fuch appellants was a chief 
inftrument for fome time in drawing gradually all 
the church under the dominion of the Lateran. It 
is true that the council of Sardica is commonly 
placed in 347, but it is erroneoufly fo placed. It 
really fate in 346, and probably about the autumn 
of that year. Athanalius is certainly the beft au- 
thority on this point, not only as a contemporary, 

o but 



194 



but becaufe he muft have been particularly accu- 
rate in this, as that very council gave a judgment 
in his favour, which indeed was the chief purpofe 
of their meeting. Now he exprefsly informs us, 
that the council of Sardica was holden the year 
after that of Milan, which he dates as three years 
after a deputation from the eaft, undoubtedly fent 
in 342, and 171 the fourth year of his abode in the 
weji. But he indifputably retired into the weft 
about the middle of the year 341. For he went 
thither in confequence of the council of Antioch, 
which met in the beginning of 34I5 and after his 
arrival at Rome a general council was fummoned, 
fate, and abfolved him before the end of the year. 
Pope Liberius too, writing in 354, fays, that eight 
years had then faffed (not that it was then the 
eighth year) Unce the deputies of the eaft withdrew 
in difcontent from the council of Milan. Surely 
thefe clear teftimonies mull very much outweigh 
fuch writers as Socrates and Sozomenes, both of 
whom hved more than a century after the council 
of Sardica. The canons of this council, as Dupin 
obferves, have been much difputed ; and he re- 
marks, that the difcipline there eftablifhed was 
clearly new, and that, by the appeal there allowed, 
the tribunal of Rome was not to have cognizance, 
but the Pope was to appoint fuch judges as he 
pleafed, under his own legate, from the bifhops of 
the other provinces. He adds too in conclulion, 

that 



195 



that the eaftern church and Africa never acknow- 
ledged thefe canons, but that the Popes held them 
high ; and, to give them the greater weight and au- 
thority, attributed them to the council of Nice. 
All this is perfe(?i:ly correal. Yet the appeal once 
eftablifhed was foon and eafily transferred to the 
papal tribunal. The execution of the fentence of 
depofition was exprefsly fufpended by the appeal ; 
and there was, perhaps, a fliill greater fource of in- 
fluence in the regulation which thefe canons intro- 
duced, that every bifhop who had any bufinefs at 
courts on going to Rome, fhould apply to the 
Pope, and that the affair fhould be negociated only 
through him with the Emperor. The importance 
which the Popes attached to thefe provifions is 
manifefted by their fraud in grafting them on the 
proceedings of the Fathers at Nice. 

I know not whether it be refining too much to 
take notice, that the prefident of the council of 
Sardica was Hofius, a native Spaniard, and Bifhop 
of Corduba, then the principal marithne city of 
Spain, a prelate who was the boafh of his country, 
and one of the mofl flrenuous fupporters of the 
chair of St. Peter. There may alfo be fome natu- 
ral connection between the operation of this vial, 
and the building of Conflantinople, inafmuch as a 
principal recommendation of that fite for a capital 
was, its opportunity for the command of the fea. 

During the period of the fecond vial, the former 
o 2 Hill 



190 

Hill continued to produce an efFedl in the quiet 
advancement and confolidation of the Proteftant 
interefh in the interior of Germany, and the feveral 
kingdoms and ftates which had embraced the re- 
formed reUgion. The year 1609, the date of the 
truce that acknowledged for twelve years the in- 
dependency of Holland^ anfwers to 367, the date 
of a law of Valentinian, giving the Pope power of 
trying all bifhops. 

And the third angel poured out his vial upon the 
rivers and fountains of waters ; and they became 
blood. And 1 heard the angel of the waters 
fay. Thou art righteous, Lord, which art, and 
waft, and fhalt be, becaufe thou hafi judged thus. 
For they have fhed the blood of faints and pro- 
phets, and thou hafi given them blood to drink ; 
for they are worthy. And I heard another out 
of the altar fay, Even fo, Lord God Almighty, 
true and righteous are thy judgments. 

Rev. xvi. 4 — 7. 

The third vial. 
The next epoch of increafe to the papal power 
was the year 378, when the Emperor Gratian con- 
firmed the law of his father Valentinian^ and grant- 
ed new prerogatives to Pope Damafus and his fee^ 
exempting him and his fucceffors from the autho- 
rity of the civil magiftrate, and making his fen- 
tences againft bifhops final. Now if we reckon 

1260 



197 



1 26o prophetical years from 378^ we fhall arrive 
at the year 1620, when began the fanguinary war 
between the Proteftants confederated at Nurem- 
berg, and the CathoHc league, which terminated in 
the peace of Weftphalia in 1648. Again, if we 
compute backward from 1648, we fhall afcend to 
the year 40 6, a year remarkable for the firft great 
exercife of alTumed fuperiority by the Pope in the 
excommunication of Atticus, Patriarch of Conftan- 
tinople, Theophilus Bilhop of Alexandria, and ge- 
nerally all the bifhops of the eaft, till reparation 
fhould be made to the memory of Chryfoftom, 
depofed by the Emperor Arcadius from the patri- 
archate of Confhantinople. There was nothing 
like this before in the fimilar difpute between the 
eaft and the weft, relative to Athanafius. On the 
contrary, when Pope Julius refle6led on the judg- 
ment of the eaftern bifhops in that affair, they 
were highly affronted, and ftrongly reprimanded 
him ; threatening him, if he did not come into 
their opinion, to break with him, and no longer 
keep peace and communion with the Roman 
church. Thus alfo, when Pope Liberius, in 352, 
excommunicated Athanafius for refufing to obey 
his fummons, the bifhops of Egypt wrote to the 
Roman pontiff, very warmly refenting his inter- 
ference, and he in confequence fent a very friendly 
letter to Athanafms. Pope Damafus too was treat- 
ed very roughly by Baiil for his ambition. But 

in 



108 



in regard to the expulfion of Chryfoftom from his 
fee, twenty-five bifhops, and all the churches of 
Mefopotamia (a country of rivers and fountains of 
waters) complained to Pope Innocent. Baronius 
and other Papifts even inlift, that Innocent on this 
occalion proceeded fo far as to excommunicate the 
Emperor Arcadius ; and fome of the later Greek 
annalilis produce letters of the Pope to that efFedl, 
copies of which, a little different^ are alfo to be 
found in the Vatican. But^ from the internal evi- 
dence, thefe epiftles appear to have been either 
forged, or at leaft very largely interpolated. If, how- 
ever, they prove nothing elfe, they prove the great 
importance of Chryfofhom's affair in the eftimation 
of the Popes and their adherents, when they trea- 
fure up in their own library fuch falfe documents 
on the fubje6l, and produce them with fo much 
triumph. 

Fleming affigns nearly the fame period which I 
have done to the immediate operation of this vial, 
except that he begins it from about 1617, a little 
inaccuratelv. The rivers and fountains of wa- 
ter, on which this vial is poured out, he explains 
to mean thofe territories of the papacy, which 
are as necefTary to it as rivers and fountains are to 
a country and a little after, rather inconfiflently 
with the letter of the prophecy at leaft, he particu- 
larizes the inland country, and feveral dominions 
of Germiany, and " the neighbouring places." But 

in 



199 



in the war^ which ended with the peace of Weft- 
phaha, there was a more hteral accompUfhment of 
the predidlion contained in thefe verfes. The 
great victories of the Proteftants and their auxilia- 
ries^ and more efpecially of the Swedes under Guf- 
tavus Adolphus, then Oxenftiern, after him Ba- 
nier, and laftly Torftenfon, were obtained near the 
rivers of the Elbe, the Rhine, the Danube, the 
Neifle, the Lech, where Tilly was killed, and the 
interjacent countries. The angel of the waters, 
therefore, is very aptly introduced. There is an 
intimation too, as this was to be a retribution, that 
fuccefs, in the early part of the war, fhould be on 
the fide of the Papifls, and that they fhould make 
a fevere and cruel ufe of it. Now this was remark- 
ably the cafe with the war in queftion. In the 
year 1631, when Guftavus began his career of 
glory, the affairs of the Proteftants were at a very 
low ebb, and in the early part of that year an 
event had happened which anfwers ftrikingly to 
the prophecy. Magdeburgh on the Elbe was 
taken" by the imperial general Tilly, who reduced 
the whole city to afhes, except the cathedral, and 
about a hundred and fifty fifhing huts on the 
banks of the river. Thirty thoufand of the inha- 
bitants perifiied by the fword, by fire, and by the 
waters, into which they were driven in great num- 
bers. Schiller, the beft hiftorian of the war, fays, 
that the flaughter was the greateft which had ever 

been 



200 

been fince the taking of Jerufalem. Chriftian of 
Brandenburgh, who had commanded the Protefhants 
in that ill-fated city, denounced to the Auftrian 
generals the fpeedy vengeance of heaven for the 
Jheddlng of fo much innocent blood. Nor were thefe 
menaces long unfulfilled. Soon after this, Gufta- 
vus defeated Tilly near Leipfic, on a branch of the 
fame river, killed feven thoufand men on the fpot, 
befides thofe who fell in the rout, took five thou- 
fand prifoners, wounded great numbers, and among 
them Tilly himfelf. The victorious monarch then 
marched to the Rhine, and fubdued all the coun- 
try on its borders. The next year, being now 
joined by the Protefi:ants of Germany, he took 
Donawert, and made incurfions on both fides of 
the Danube, which Tilly endeavouring to prevent 
by defending the paflage of the Lech, was defeated 
and mortally wounded, furrendering with his life 
thofe laurels which he had ftained, as hifhorians 
fay, with deluges of innocent blood." Who 
can read this account of his death, and the fevere 
chaffcifement inflidled then, and at the battle of 
Leipfic, on the army, which had been the infi:ru- 
ment of his cruelties, and not join with the voice 
from the altar, (the place where lay the fouls of 
the martyrs, c. vi. 9.) Even fo. Lord God Al- 
mighty, true and righteous are thy judgments ?" 
Neither may it be impertinent to remark, that the 
year 1631, which firft refi:ored the almofi: ruined 

affairs 



201 



affairs of the Proteftants in Germany, was exa6lly 
the completion of 1260 prophetical years, from 
the only great event, that moft eflentially added to 
the papal power, not yet mentioned ; the final 
abrogation of Paganifm, and undifputed eflablifh- 
ment of Christianity at Rome under Theodofius, 
in 389. As every year from the firffc fuccefles of 
Guftavus continued, nearly down to the peace, to 
be marked by fome fignal exploit of the confede- 
rates, and the rapid decline of the imperial power, 
it might feem too minute to point out a parallel to 
the decrees of Honorius in favour of the church in 
399, or his fubfequent retirement to Ravenna on 
the invafion of Italy by Alaric, and other fuch cir- 
cumflances, which incidentally and collaterally 
contributed to advance or confirm the papal au- 
thority or influence. The mofl: interefi:ing epoch 
is that of the peace itfelf in 1 648, and ratified the 
following year. That treaty fixed the degradation 
of the German branch of the houfe of Aafl:ria, as 
the naval war under the preceding vial had entirely 
broken the maritime fupremacy before enjoyed by 
the Catholic king. The operation alfo of the for- 
mer two vials was difcernible in the treaty. The 
peace of religion in 1555 was exprefsly con- 
firmed by it, as definitively fettled in 1556. New 
Hipulations favourable to the Protefl:ants were add- 
ed, and new fecularizations made to gratify and in- 
demnify fome of the confederates^ while the Swifs 

p cantons 



202 , 

cantons were formally exempted from any fubjec- 
tion to the empire. The Dutch too, who had 
continued to extend their dominion over the fea, 
obtained for the firft time an indefinite and abfo- 
lute acknowledgment of their independency, and a 
right to trade with the Indies, 



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